Blood In The Water
by It Belongs In A Museum
Summary: Sequel to Black Water. A lot changed for Charlie the night of the formal. The line between hunters and werewolves was drawn, Lydia was acting off, another creature was wreaking havoc, and, oh yeah, she may or may not be losing her mind. And possibly scarier than all of that, she was starting to have actual, human feelings for a certain best friend. Just another day in Beacon Hills.
1. Sweet Dreams

**Disclaimer: 'Teen Wolf' isn't mine. Shocking, right? But it's true. If there are any similarities in content or dialogue, it has probably originated with the show.**

Chapter 1 – Sweet Dreams

_White. Everything around her was a dazzling white. Not that soft glow that could be considered comforting, but that painful, stabbing glare that made your eyes ache to look into it. And she was cold. Freezing cold._

"_Hello?"_

_The sound of Charlie's voice echoed in her ears, like it was hitting the walls of a cave. But as loud as she called, nobody answered. She was alone. Lifting her hands out in front of her, she began to walk forwards, reaching blindly into the light. The ground beneath her was flat and smooth, almost like tile. Her feet slapped loudly against it as she moved, but that was the only sound that she heard. "Is anybody there?"_

_Once again, she received no response. Without anything to see or hear, she lost all sense of time. She groped around in the blinding white for what could have been minutes or days. Lost. She was completely lost. And not only that, she had no way to find herself. Charlie's heart began to pound in her chest, making it feel as though it was going to break through her rib cage. Her breaths became heavier and deeper, and suddenly her head started to spin. She was having a panic attack._

_Charlie tried to slow her breath down—to take it in quick, short pants—but it was spiraling out of control. She began sucking in air at such a high rate, she felt as though she was swallowing it. Her ears were ringing and where there was no sound before, she now found it deafening. But over everything else she heard the piercing noise of a familiar beeping sound. It wasn't long before she realized it was beeping in time with her heart rate._

_It was the sound of a heart monitor. A sound she was all too familiar with._

_Gradually her heartbeat began to even out and the sound of that beeping slowed down with it. Her breaths became calmer. And as the overwhelming anxiety began to leak out of her, that impossibly white light shining in her eyes began to fade away. At first everything was washed out and blurry—all she could see were shadowed outlines. The light had made tears spring up in her eyes, and when she blinked them away, she could see clearly._

_She was in the hospital. Only it wasn't bustling with doctors or patients or loved ones waiting to hear good and bad news—it was completely empty. Charlie looked up and down the corridor she found herself in. She was completely and totally alone. A strong breeze whipped through the hall, making Charlie shiver. She wrapped her around her waist and tried to pull the flimsy fabric closer in. It was only then that she realized she was wearing one of those flimsy, faded blue hospital gowns._

_Charlie's eyes darted around, looking for any other sign of life. She began picking her way down the hall, and as she moved the beeping noise began to grow louder and louder. It was like a homing beacon, pulling her towards it. Finally she found herself standing in front of room 254. Reading that number made her body physically shake. Her father had died in room 254._

_Taking a deep breath, she locked down that feeling of panic clawing at her throat. She reached for the handle and pushed gently, making it swing open with a resounding squeak. She held her breath as she walked through the door, unsure of what she would find inside. And then when she saw it she knew it could never have been anything else. Lydia._

"_Please be okay," Charlie whispered, taking small steps towards her friend's still form. "I need you to be okay. Please, please be okay."_

_She was lying on one of those hospital beds, those sterile white sheets carefully tucked in around her. She looked almost peaceful with her red hair fanned out around her. She could have been sleeping instead of fighting for her life. There were no bruises or cuts, there was no blood. The serene look on her face turned her into one of those Disney princesses. Except Lydia would make damn sure she had better footwear._

_Charlie almost didn't want to go near her—didn't want to find out how she was—because the answer she got might not be the one she wanted. As much as uncertainty hurt, not getting the right answer would be even worse. Letting out a shaky breath, Charlie approached her and wrapped her hand around Lydia's wrist. Her skin was warm and her pulse was strong. Charlie let out a soft sight of relief. Until she realized something. Lydia wasn't hooked up to any machines. The beeping was coming from somewhere else._

_Slowly, Charlie turned around. There was another bed in the room, but someone had pulled one of those separating curtains around it. She wasn't sure why, but her heart began beating more quickly. There was something on the other side of the curtain—something important. She grabbed hold of the fabric and pulled it to the side, and what she saw made her heart plummet into her stomach. Lying on the bed next to Lydia's was a familiar-looking little girl. Charlie was looking at herself._

_The little girl was lying on top of the sheets, wearing a worn Star Wars T-shirt and ripped jeans, her hair pulled into two messy braids. She was surrounded by tubes and wires and machines—a tube jammed into her throat, electrodes stuck to her, and Leonard the kangaroo tucked under her arm. At that point Charlie thought her heart stopped, but the persistent beeping told her different. She reached forward and pushed some of the hair out of the smaller version of herself's face, ignoring the slight shaking of her hand._

"_Ugh, how cliché."_

_The sound of another voice in the room made Charlie jump in surprise, snatching her hand away from the girl. She spun around and her eyes locked on the other person there. She must have walked straight past him—she didn't know how she didn't see him. Sitting there in one of the guest chairs, legs crossed and idly flipping through a copy of Us Weekly, was Peter Hale. In that moment, something in Charlie's mind changed, like she had been shocked. She was aware—she knew that all of this, the hospital, Lydia, the little girl, Peter...she knew none of it was actually real. She was dreaming—it was all some construct inside her head. But that didn't mean the fear went away. Peter shot her that smug smile of his before continuing._

"_I mean honestly, Charlie," he sighed out. "Are we really going with metaphorical insecurities like this? I thought it would be a little more interesting in your head. Instead I get shoved in a room with blank walls, a coma girl and this—" he waved around the Us Weekly "—this sad excuse for reading material. I mean since when is Brangelina a thing? Brad and Jennifer were perfect for each other. What happened?"_

_Charlie stared at him, eyes wide and frozen in fear. Peter Hale, a man she had watched die hours before, was sitting in front of her making snarky commentary about tabloid headlines. After a few moments of gaping like a fish out of water, her lips found a way to work again. "You—you're supposed to be dead," was all that she managed to force out._

_Peter let out a small scoff and rolled his eyes, like he was disappointed. He flipped the magazine shut and tossed it on the chair next to him. "Really?" he demanded, his voice dripping in contempt. "Our big reunion and that's all you have to say to me?"_

"_What the hell did you expect to hear?" she whispered back, still reeling from his sudden reappearance. "Were we going to hold hands and sing songs? Skip off into the sunset? Go on a road trip and drive off a cliff Thelma and Louise style?"_

_Peter smirked and jerked his head to the side noncommittally. "Would I get to be Thelma?"_

"_The cute and stupid one?" Charlie muttered, narrowing her eyes at him. "Sure. That seems to fit."_

_He let out a laugh and clapped his hands together. "And there it is. That conversational spark that I love oh-so much. You know, I think you would have missed me. At least a little bit."_

"_Just because you like listening to yourself talk doesn't mean everybody else does," she growled. "Why are you here?"_

"_I told you," Peter insisted, looking at her earnestly. "I just want to talk."_

"_What could we possibly have to talk about?"_

_Peter pursed his lips and stared up at the corkboard ceiling, a pensive look on his face. "Oh, I don't know. We've had some good times. We could sit back...reminisce. Maybe an apology. You know, for shooting me. Repeatedly." When she didn't respond, he rolled his eyes again. "You don't have to worry—we're not in the throes of a zombie apocalypse. You're dreaming."_

_Charlie let out a bitter snort. Finally she found her voice, and her rage. She folded her arms across her chest and did her best to look intimidating—not an easy feat given the hospital gown she was wearing. "Yeah," she said with a passive aggressive laugh. "I know I'm dreaming. You know how I know that? Because the last time I saw you were being grilled like a fourth of July hot dog." She paused waiting for a response, but all she got was that same blank, slightly judgmental stare. "Get it?" she prompted. "Because you were lit on fire and you're a were—"_

_Peter gave her a withering look. "Yes, Charlie," he sneered. "I understood the joke. I just thought that kind of tasteless humor was beneath you."_

"_So the mass-murdering psychopath is judging me," she shot back, her lip curling slightly. "Wow. I wonder how much I care. Spoiler alert: Not a lot."_

"_Please," Peter replied, shaking his head at her. "Can we at least try to be civilized? I mean look at me." He gestured to himself. "You shot me. I'm not holding a grudge."_

_Charlie stared at him, her mouth hanging open slightly. Peter was slick, she had to give him that much. And somehow whenever she spoke with him, she felt dirty. "You put Lydia in the hospital," she growled back. "You tried to kill pretty much all of us. Twice. What can I say, that's not the type of thing I let go of easily. I'm petty like that." _

_Peter chuckled, and the sound of it sent a chill running down her spine. Every time she saw him, she got the distinct impression he knew something she didn't. He stood up from his seat and wandered over past Charlie, coming to a stop next to the bed the younger her was lying in. That nagging feeling of anxiety bloomed in her chest. She knew she was dreaming—that none of this was real—but she still felt like he could hurt her. "I've got to say," Peter said, peering down at her small form. "You were a cute kid."_

_Charlie watched him carefully. He braced his hands against the side of the bed and leaned forwards, hovering over little Charlie. "Why are you here?" she demanded angrily._

"_It's your subconscious, Charlie," Peter murmured, not bothering to look at her and not moving from his threatening position. "You tell me."_

"_Maybe I just wanted to punch you in the face one last time," she muttered._

_Peter snorted and a knowing smile at the corner of his lips. "Maybe," he said, nodding to himself. Then he lapsed into a silence. It was like the air was crackling with electricity. Slowly, Peter turned his head so that he was looking at her. "Or maybe I'm here to finish what I started."_

_Instinctively, Charlie's hand flew up to the back of her neck, feeling for the point where Peter's claws had dug into her neck. She expected to feel a row of four large scabs, but the skin was totally completely smooth. Fear shot through her veins, but she didn't even have the time to panic. Before she knew what was happening, Peter was standing directly in front of her, staring down at her with that cruel smile. "You might feel a slight pinch."_

_He opened his mouth and those teeth of his—the ones that had always seemed pointy to her—extended into sharp fangs. Peter lunged forward and grabbed her by the hair, yanking her head back. A strangled cry erupted from Charlie's throat and she struggled against him, but he was too strong. And she was left waiting for the feeling of teeth cutting through skin._

"Holy shit!"

Charlie gasped for breath and twitched violently as she woke. It had all felt so palpably real. Even when she was dreaming she had known none of it was real, but everything had just been so vivid. Her heart was still racing and a thin sheen of sweat coated her forehead. Immediately her hand went to the back of her neck, her fingers probing around to the skin covering her spine. They came into contact with rough, raised scabs, and she winced heavily at the ache that radiated from the point. But as much as it hurt, Charlie couldn't help but give a sigh of relief. That pain meant that she was still her—that she was still human.

Gradually, that dream she had been so violently ripped out of began to fall away from her like shards of broken glass and she became more aware of her surroundings. Her eyes roved around, taking everything in while her confused brain pieced everything together. At first she felt a twinge of alarm when she realized she wasn't in her room, but then, piece by piece, everything snapped back into place.

She was at the hospital. Not wandering around the hallways chasing ghosts and phantom beeping noises, but sitting in a chair in the middle of the waiting area. The same place she had been all weekend. It made a weird sort of sense that she was in the hospital waiting room. She was in a hospital waiting room the first time her world had imploded, sitting in a chair equally as uncomfortable as the one she now found herself in now. Only that time she had sat there for a few hours. This time it was days.

The longer she sat there, the more convinced she became that waiting rooms were like purgatory. The TVs stuck on that one mediocre cable channel that played nothing but soap operas and the unnecessarily chipper Kelly Ripa, the inescapable smell of industrial cleaning solvents, the annoying squeak of the linoleum cushioning on the chairs—all of it was horrible. But none of it was worse than the faces. You would look around out of every three or four people you would find one with that look—the puffy, purple rings under the eyes from the sheer exhaustion, the stooped shoulders, and the creased foreheads. Those were the ones who had to sit there in suspense—no information, nothing you can do to make things better—and wait for some external force to decide your fate and the fate of the people they cared about. Then that doctor would come out with the white lab coat and clipboard and tell them something that could save them or destroy them. Charlie had been one of those people.

As Charlie slowly blinked her eyes and forced herself into consciousness, she felt her pillow shift underneath her. Charlie blinked against the harsh, fluorescent lights, but she was still forced to squint as it assaulted her retinas. As it turned out, her pillow was especially mobile because it happened to be another person.

Stiles. He had been there as long as she had. The two of them had sat in that waiting area yards away from Lydia's door since the epic showdown at the Hale house, talking, playing cards, or just staying with each other. That is until the bottomless cup of bitter, acidic-tasting hospital coffee stopped doing its job and her eyes started to droop. Charlie's stomach jumped slightly as she looked up at him. Her head was resting on his chest. She could feel it rise and fall as he breathed and the soft, slow thumping of his heartbeat sounded in her ears. He was sprawled out across the seat next to hers in an almost impossible position, with his mouth hanging open and a little stream of drool trailing out of his mouth. Objectively it wasn't the most flattering of poses, but Charlie still couldn't help the tiny smile that pulled at the corner of her lips. Despite everything that had happened to her the past few days—being strangled, stabbed, watching Lydia in that hospital bed, having Allison basically disown her—Charlie somehow felt at least a little bit safe. And she really, really didn't want to move from that spot. Which meant that she probably should.

Charlie tried to get to her feet, but found it a little more difficult than she had anticipated. Stiles's arm was slung over her shoulder and somehow while sleeping he managed to tangle his fingers in her hair. It took about ten minutes and some ridiculous contortions to avoid waking him up, but somehow she managed to do it, leaving him snoring and drooling on the seats. As soon as the weight of her body was gone, Stiles smacked his lips and muttered something incoherent before readjusting so that his leg was draped over the armrest of her seat in a position that couldn't be comfortable. Charlie gave a light snort and watched him for a moment, shaking her head at him. And then she looked next to him, at that slightly deflated 'Get Well Soon' balloon with giant yellow smiley faces on it. He had gone and got it at the hospital gift shop as soon as the doctors said that Lydia would make a full recovery. But it had been almost a day since Stiles bought that balloon,-Saturday had disappeared into Sunday—and Lydia still wasn't waking up. Which was why, as confident as the doctors seemed to be, Charlie had that constant undercurrent of anxiety flooding through her veins. Beacon Hills might have excellent medical facilities, but she doubted very much that any of the staff had taken a course in Lycanthropy 101 during medical school.

Then, all of the sudden, something changed. The lights around her seemed to flare and stabbed at her eyes while an impossible pain erupted behind her forehead. It felt like her head was caving in and about to explode all at once. And then the flashes came. Fire, screams, pain—all of it was existing in her head all at once. Her vision swam and black began creeping in, leaving her with nothing but those images in her brain. Charlie wobbled on her feet, almost falling over before her hand managed to find a nearby chair, steadying herself. She pressed the heel of her other hand to her forehead, like she was trying to push back the pain, and gritted her teeth to hold back the scream. Just as she thought she couldn't bear it any more, just when she thought she would fall to her knees and scream, it vanished.

Charlie opened her eyes and she could see reality again. Her sweaty palm slipped against the smooth plastic of the chair, making her cling on even tighter. She let out some shaky breaths as she steadied herself. The pain subsided, but it left behind a sinking feeling of worry. Why was this still happening? Peter was dead—why was all of that still in her mind?

"Excuse me?" a kind voice said from behind her. Charlie spun around to find an older woman staring at her with concern. "Are you alright?"

Charlie swallowed heavily and nodded. "Y—yeah," she stammered out, still feeling a bit out of breath. "Yeah, I'm fine. Just a stress headache." The woman didn't seem to entirely accept the weak explanation and opened her mouth to speak again, but Charlie cut her off. "I just, um, I just need to get some water."

Immediately, she spun on her heel and tripped down the hallway to the bathroom. Luckily the path from the waiting room to the bathroom was a well worn one by that point, otherwise she might have ended up running into a hell of a lot of people. Or walls. Once she stumbled into the room, she kicked open all the stall doors, said a silent thank you to the universe that it was completely empty. She moved back to the front door and threw the deadbolt into the locked position before going to the sinks and splashing an impossible amount of cold water onto her face.

Charlie gripped the sides of the sink, digging her fingers into the porcelain and staring down the drain, like maybe—just maybe—the answers to everything could be hiding down those pipes. But she didn't see anything new. Except maybe for a bit of black mold that probably shouldn't be in a hospital bathroom.

Slowly, Charlie lifted her head and looked at her own reflection. She had certainly looked better. There was a purple bruising color under her eyes from lack of sleep, her skin had a pale, sallow color to it, every last trace of makeup was gone, and her hair was stringy and knotted. Overall not the picture of youthful exuberance she was apparently supposed to be. Hell, even her freckles looked pale. But all that could be chalked up to a couple of sleepless nights in an uncomfortable chair. What really gave her away were the eyes. They looked hollow. Not empty, but there was a sadness behind them that Charlie had never really seen before.

"Suck it up, Oswin," she whispered to herself. "If you break now that would just be pathetic."

Charlie took all those thoughts—the dream, Peter, the flashes that kept invading her mind—and shoved them away, filing them in the 'shit not to be thought about file' in the filing cabinet that was her brain. She splashed water on her face a few more times and made a lame attempt to comb through her hair with her fingers before stepping back and observing her full appearance in the mirror. For some reason the only thing she could think was that Lydia would probably have thrown a fit. She was wearing her usual Converse, a pair of ratty old jeans, and the turtleneck that Mel had dropped off for her earlier that day. She grabbed that hair tie out of the bottom of her pocket and pulled back her hair into a tight ponytail, grateful that the turtleneck could properly conceal her bruises, and took one last breath before walking out the bathroom.

Once out, Charlie pressed herself against the corridor wall and watched for a few moments as people walked back and forth before turning down the hall. To the left, she would find herself back in the waiting area. To the right, she would find herself at the door to Lydia's room. And that scared the crap out of her.

Over the past few days, Charlie had been pretty much everywhere in that hospital. Hell, she had even tried to sneak into the on-call room for a nap. But not once had she ever gone to Lydia's room. She had harassed Lydia's doctors and stolen the charts out of their hands to get a look at the information they had, but she hadn't dared go anywhere near the girl herself. Because each time she took one step towards that door, a tsunami of guilt would crash into her, leaving her breathless.

It was her fault when it came down to it. Peter might have been the one to bite her, but Charlie put her on that field. Those words Peter said to her when she begged him to let Lydia live. 'You're the ones who care about her.' That was what he had said. Which meant that this—all of it—was on her. Lydia was the unwitting collateral damage in Charlie's fight. And the thought of it made Charlie want to vomit. But as bad as seeing Lydia would be, failing her a second time would be even worse.

"Suck it up, Oswin."

That phrase was becoming her mantra now. Like she had to convince herself not to fall apart. Charlie took another deep breath and shifted to the right before heading down the hallway. Her feet felt heavy, like they were encased in lead, as she trudged towards the room. That cold pit she felt building in her stomach grew with every step that she took. By the time she found herself staring through that window into the hospital, her veins had turned to ice.

The Lydia she saw on the other side of that window was not the one she had seen in her dream. She didn't have that perfectly glossy hair, bright red lips, or glowing skin. Quite the contrary. Her hair was a matted, tangled mess and her lips were pale and dry. Again, that sick feeling lurched through Charlie's stomach. Lydia didn't look like Lydia, and Charlie hated it. She hated that bed and those sheets and the needle sticking out of her arm. She hated it all.

The only other person in the room was Lydia's mother. Charlie still didn't know much about the woman, but she was fairly certain Mrs. Martin didn't look quite herself either. She was sitting in a chair next to Lydia's bed, leaning an elbow on the side table and propping up her head as she stared at her daughter through drooping eyelids. Exhaustion was written into every line of her face. By chance she glanced up and saw Charlie in the window, making the girl twitch with surprise and anxiety. The softest ghost of a smile appeared on the woman's face and she lifted a hand, beckoning Charlie to come in. Charlie's stomach began tying itself into knots again as she timidly walked through the door.

"Hi, Charlie," Mrs. Martin murmured in a tired-sounding voice. "It is Charlie, isn't it?"

Charlie swallowed heavily and nodded. She and Mrs. Martin still didn't know each other very well. Or at all, really. For some reason Charlie never ended up spending much time at Lydia's house—they always went to hers or Allison's—and during the time they did spend at Lydia's house, her mother was never there. Though that was probably by design. Lydia did like her privacy. So when Mrs. Martin greeted her, Charlie strode forward. "Yeah," she muttered as Mrs. Martin took her hand and gave it a firm shake. "Yeah, um, I'm Charlie."

"Lydia's told me a lot about you," Mrs. Martin murmured, her eyes straying back to her daughter. She let out a sharp breath that sounded like a cross between a snort and a sigh of frustration. "And by that I mean she's mentioned your name once or twice at the dinner table."

"Yeah," Charlie said, bobbing her head along with her words. "That sounds like Lydia. She's never been much of a 'sharer' I guess."

"No," Mrs. Martin murmured, more to herself than to Charlie. "No, she most certainly is not."

Charlie's eyes were dragged back to Lydia's limp form. There was no movement. None. No signs of life except for the slight movement of her chest. The only real indication of life was the beeping of the heart monitor, and she wasn't even sure she trusted that.

"I'm sorry," Charlie whispered, sending a few fleeting glances in Mrs. Martin's direction. "For not visiting till now—I'm sorry. I...don't do well in hospitals."

A sad, sympathetic smile crossed Mrs. Martin's face. "That's alright," she murmured. "I saw you in the waiting room when I went to get my coffee. I know Lydia would appreciate you being here." A strange look crossed Mrs. Martin's face as she looked at Charlie. Like she had seen something in Charlie's face. "I'll tell you what," she continued. "Why don't I give you a little time alone with her?"

For some reason a sensation of panic suddenly shot through Charlie. Like she was afraid she might break Lydia if she was left alone with her. "W—what?" she stammered out in confusion.

Mrs. Martin grabbed her purse and stood up. "I need to get another cup of coffee. Would you mind watching her till I get back?" Mrs. Martin didn't allow for an answer. She strode to the door with determination but paused as soon as she got to the doorframe, sparing Charlie one more look. She sighed and rapped her knuckles against the door a couple of times. "You should try talking to her," she said, her voice barely a whisper. "It helps."

And with that Charlie was left alone in the room. For some reason she felt like a thirteen-year-old on her first babysitting gig. What if something went terribly, terribly wrong? Charlie bit her lip and folded her arms across her chest, bouncing up and down on the balls of her feet. Seeing Lydia like that—it made her want to run. To sprint out the door and keep going until she got home. Or to Maine. Anywhere to get her as far away from the guilt as possible. And there was a time not so long ago when she probably would. But she couldn't to that. She couldn't run—not anymore. Lydia deserved better than that. And she was better than that now.

Gnawing on her fingernails, Charlie slowly shuffled towards Mrs. Martin's now vacant chair. She perched on the seat and quickly lifted her feet from the ground, drawing her knees to her chest and wrapping her arms around them. She sat there for a few minutes, just watching her, and an ache began to form in her throat and in her chest. It physically hurt to look at her. And everything in the room was so unbearably quiet. Lydia was supposed to be talking and laughing and criticizing her footwear. Charlie sat there a long, long time before she said anything. One minute turned into five turned into twenty. "I'm sorry it took me so long to show up."

"You can't hear me," she muttered, never taking her eyes off her friend. "I know you can't hear me. I never really got why people would talk to people in comas—you know, in the movies and stuff? It's not like it served any purpose. I always just thought it was a narrative tool the writers would use to reveal information to the audience. Turns out I was wrong. They did it because it made them feel better." At that point Charlie's eyes started to sting as they filled with tears. She sucked in a long breath and squeezed her eyes shut, causing one small tear to leak out of each eyes. She didn't bother to wipe them away as they coursed down her face. "So the doctors said you'd be totally fine like a day ago," Charlie continued, forcing her voice to stay casual and idly playing with her shoelaces. "I know you like being 'fashionably late', but this hardly seems like the time, does it? So would just wake the hell up and be okay? For me? Please?"

Charlie's voice cracked on that last word. Even to her own ear she sounded desperate. And why shouldn't she? She was desperate. She sighed heavily and pinched the bridge of her nose. The heart monitor only served to show just how quiet everything else in there was. It was oppressive, and she felt a need to fill that silence.

"So a lot happened since the last time we talked," she muttered under her breath. "I shot a guy like eight times, so that's new. Plus there's a fairly decent chance that I'm going completely batcrap crazy. I'm talking the whole deal—hallucinations and everything. And now I'm talking to myself, which isn't exactly disproving that theory." Charlie wrapped her arms even tighter around her knees, curling into a ball like she was trying to block out the rest of the world. "Allison's not talking to me," she continued, her voice barely a whisper. "I've left her like a hundred messages, but she hasn't picked up or called me back. Honestly, I think she might never call me back after." Charlie dug her nails into the flesh of her calves, that slight pain providing a bit of an emotional release. "I've told a lot of lies and I've hurt a lot of people. And honestly I'm not even sure I want Allison to forgive me. Because I deserve it. For what happened to you—I definitely deserve it."

Charlie paused and stared at Lydia, like she expected to get a response. Part of her was sure Lydia would suddenly sit up, let out a loud, musical scoff, flip her hair over her shoulder, and tell Charlie she was being a total idiot and to stop whining. But that didn't happen.

"So Allison and Scott are back together," Charlie barreled on. "Or at least I think they are. Neither of them have told me specifically, but I think the spit-swapping was a fairly good indicator. And speaking of all that gooey romantic crap, there might have been a bit of development." She pressed her lips together into a small 'o' and blew out a long breath. "Remember how you kept saying that I some sort of emotionally stunted mutant alien because I never really had a crush on any of the drooling cavemen that occupy Beacon Hills High? Well that's sort of changed."

"Remember how I got you to go to the dance with Stiles? Well there's kind of something I didn't tell you about that. I didn't like that plan. I know I came up with it, but I didn't like it at all. And my emotionally constipated self didn't really get why. Until I kissed him."

"I know, right?" Charlie exclaimed with false enthusiasm. "I mean who the hell would have expected for that to happen? He definitely didn't. I'm actually pretty sure the only person who expected it less than him was me. And now I don't have any freaking clue what to do with these...feelings. You know me—I need a decoder ring when it comes to this sort of stuff. You're my decoder ring. So you need to wake up. Right now."

Still nothing. "Okay," Charlie murmured almost anxiously. "Okay—that's not enough incentive for you? You need more than that? Try this on for size. Lydia, if you don't wake up, I'll start wearing orthopedic shoes. I'll start wearing Crocs. I swear I will."

Even that wasn't enough. Charlie uncurled from that little ball and placed her feet back on the ground before dragging the chair up to the side of the bed. Leaning forwards, she rested her arms on the bed in front of her, laying them out flat and resting her shin on her folded hands. After a few minutes she reached out one hand, linking some of her fingers with Lydia's cold, motionless ones. "You know, this is probably the first completely honest conversation I've had in months," she whispered. "And the only person I can have it with is unconscious. How sad is that? But then again I guess you can relate. I mean I know you better than pretty much anyone else, and I've just scratched the surface. Who knows, maybe someday we'll be able to sit down and be totally open. No secrets." Charlie felt her throat begin to ache, that sob of anxiety and grief threatening to burst forth at any moment. "I love you, Lydia. I can count the number of people I've said that to on less than one hand. And half of those people are dead now. Don't make it two-thirds. I need you to be okay—please be okay."

Charlie's vision began to cloud as her eyes began to fill with tears again. She rested her forehead against the cool sheets and tried to keep it all in—to force it all back inside of her. Then, all of the sudden, there was a resounding squeak as the door to Lydia's room swung open. Charlie quickly threw herself up into the sitting position to see who the intruder was only to find Mrs. McCall walking in, staring down at her clip board. Her hair was frizzing slightly and her shoulders were stooped like she was tired. She was probably nearing the end of a shift. After closing the door behind her, Mrs. McCall looked up from her notes. As soon as her eyes fell on Charlie she jumped in alarm, placing her hand over her heart and breathing heavily. Charlie quickly wiped those last few tears again to hide them, but she was too slow.

"Oh my God!" Mrs. McCall said, holding a hand out in some sort of gesture of apology. "I'm—I'm so sorry! I didn't see anybody in here—I would have knocked—" The shocked expression on her face quickly morphed into one of sympathy. "It's—it's Charlie, right?"

"That's what my aunt keeps telling me," Charlie murmured. "She doesn't have any reason to lie, so I believe her most days."

Mrs. McCall gave her a weird look and nodded. "Right. I remember you from the last minute super-secret last minute chemistry project that I'm pretty sure was fake. Scott said you gave him a suit for the dance. I mean one that wasn't salvaged from a garbage disposal. That was—that was really nice of you."

"Not really," Charlie said with a snort that was probably a little to flemmy. She wiped at her eyes again and cleared her throat. "It was more of a public service type thing. Lydia here—" she jerked a thumb in Lydia's direction, her hand tightened into a fist to keep it from shaking "—she probably would have had a seizure if she looked directly at that other one."

"H—yeah," Mrs. McCall breathed out, issuing forth a slightly relieved laugh. But then that relief disappeared again. She looked down at the chart scanning it carefully. "This says that she's going to be fine. There's no reason she shouldn't be awake right now—the doctor's are coming in to do some tests and—" Mrs. McCall suddenly looked up from the chart, a wince carved into the lines of her face. "Right," she bit out pointing a finger at Charlie awkwardly. "That's not going to make you feel better, is it? What I'm trying to say is it's just a matter of time. Before she wakes up, I mean."

Charlie pulled nervously at the end of her ponytail and nodded in understanding. "Yeah, I know," she whispered. She lifted her eyes from Lydia to look up at Mrs. McCall. "Do you guys have a stopwatch or countdown clock or something? Crystal ball? Hell, I'll take a Ouija board or Taro cards."

"I'm afraid they didn't figure crystal balls into this year's budget," Mrs. McCall said with a sheepish shrug of the shoulders. She pressed her lips together in a thin line and walked around the bed, placing a reassuring hand on Charlie's shoulder. Charlie twitched slightly upon feeling it there, but Mrs. McCall didn't remove it. "I know it seems like forever now, but I promise as soon as she's awake it'll seem like nothing at all. Like the blink of an eye, or, you know, the length of a Sarah McLaughlin song. Time's funny like that."

Normally Charlie would have shrugged the hand away, but for some reason this time she let it rest there. As jumpy as Mrs. McCall seemed, there was something calming effect about her. Like some sort of aura of maternal comfort. After a few minutes, Mrs. McCall gave a sigh. "I hate to do this to you," she said carefully, "but we do need to run some tests. Just standard stuff. Nothing you need to worry about."

Charlie's hand reached forwards and wrapped around Lydia's. The differences between them were startling. Lydia's was small, cold, and limp, the fingers perfectly manicured. Charlie's on the other hand was a bit larger and warm, and the nails had been bitten to the quick. "I'm going to worry anyway," she muttered.

"Yeah. Yeah, I figured as much. I mean, I would too."

Slowly, Charlie released Lydia's hand and got to her feet, dragging them as she moved back towards the door.

"Charlie," Mrs. McCall called out after her, making her pause in the doorway. "As soon as anything changes—as soon as you can come in—I'll let you know."

Charlie's lips quirked up in the faintest attempt at a smile and she nodded. "Thanks."

Upon exiting Lydia's room, Charlie didn't immediately return to the waiting area. Her head was aching. Somewhere between the fever-inducing dreams and the crying, she had become dehydrated. And if there was one thing that she learned after everything she had been through with her dad, it was that chocolate kind of helped. She filled that empty void inside of her with more Snickers than should under normal circumstances be physically possible. She came up to the machines and quickly shoved some coins into the drink machine. Snatching up her water, she turned to the next machine over and pressed her lips together in a thin smile. "'Sup, Bob," she muttered, patting her hand against the glass of the now familiar machine. "Old, dependable Bob." She shoved in the asked for $1.25 and watched as that little corkscrew thing twisted and dropped a Snickers in the bottom. As per usual, it spun a little bit too far, but this time the usual second Snickers didn't fall with that satisfying thunk. Instead it stayed there hanging precariously over the edge, but remained firmly in place. And then a swooping feeling of disappointment washed through her. Like this was yet another mini-betrayal. "Seriously?"

Charlie banged her hand against the front of the machine, making it shift slightly. The extra Snickers wobbled slightly, but once again didn't move. So Charlie hit it again. And again. Until she wasn't sure what she was hitting anymore. Maybe it was Peter, maybe it was herself. But she just kept slamming her palm into the machine until long after her hand began to hurt. She wasn't sure what made her do it—some bizarre mix of rage, guilt and heartache. And she would have gone on for much longer—probably until her hand started bleeding—but then she heard something that made her stop. A light thunk.

That second Snickers had fallen to the bottom of the machine and was waiting for her. Charlie frowned down at the candy bars, still breathing heavily from the exertion. Strangely enough, she felt the tiniest bit better. She had needed a release, some way to let go, at least a little bit, of all those things she was bottling up inside of her. And Bob had just given her that. Again, she patted her hand against the glass again. "Thanks, Bob."

Shoving one of the candy bars in her back pocket and tucking the water bottle under her arm, Charlie made her way back to the waiting area. By the time she got there the first Snickers was already long gone, the wrapper tossed in one of the trash cans on the way. Or maybe Charlie had swallowed it. She really couldn't be sure. When she did finally arrive at that row of chairs, she found Stiles awake again, drumming his fingers against the armrest, craning his neck and twisting his head around like he was looking for someone. When his eyes fell on her, his face collapsed into one of confused relief. "Where did you go?" he demanded. "I woke up and you were just like 'poof'!" He waved his hands around theatrically. "Gone."

Wordlessly, Charlie shoved her hand in her back pocket and pulled out the Snickers bar, holding it out for him to see. "Sustenance run," she replied. "Gotta keep those blood sugar levels up." She strode over and collapsed into the chair next to him, pulling up both her legs so she was sitting cross-legged. She began to open that second candy bar, but she felt Stiles's eyes on her, studying her.

"It takes you that long to buy a candy bar?" he demanded skeptically.

"I went to the bathroom," she continued with a shrug of her shoulders. Charlie wasn't sure why she was being so evasive. But if Stiles hadn't noticed her creep out of Lydia's room, she wanted to keep her thoughts and actions to herself. For now at least.

"So you spent like twenty minutes in the bathroom?" His voice wasn't totally devoid of judgment, making Charlie give a loud groan. "Man, what the hell do girls do in the bathroom?" he mused. "Is there like some sort of magical door that leads to Narnia?"

"You'll never know," Charlie said with a prim shrug. "Girls aren't allowed to tell guys what goes on in the bathroom. It's a part of the girl code. Sacred."

Stiles snapped his fingers and pointed at Charlie accusingly, giving her a weird look. "Hey! I made you an honorary bro!"

Charlie frowned and made a face at him. "Does that mean you want to be an honorary chick?"

Stiles's stared at her for a moment, his mouth hanging open slightly. "Yeahhhhhh, I think I'll give that one a pass. Otherwise I think you'd make me start talking about 'Downton Abbey' and I don't think I'm ready for that now. Or, you know, ever."

A cheeky smile spread across his face. That one that always made her want to smile too. Only today she didn't feel like smiling. Charlie chuckled, trying to seem as normal as possible, but Stiles seemed to pick up on the fact that there was something off. He shifted in his seat so that he was staring directly at her. "What's wrong?" he demanded.

Charlie bit her lip and shrugged her shoulders casually. "Nothing."

"Bullshit," Stiles said, shaking his head at her. "I am well versed in all the faces of Charlie Oswin and that—" he waved a finger in her face "—that is your 'something's wrong' face. Though at this point I should probably start calling it you 'something's more wrong than usual' face."

There were so many things wrong Charlie wouldn't have known where to start even if she wanted to tell him. She should tell him about the dream. She should tell him about the hallucination. She knew she should. But she also knew Stiles. If she told him, he would go into his frantic conspiracy theory phase and try to fix her when she wasn't even sure there was anything broken yet. And at the same time she just didn't want him to know—she didn't want anybody to know. Because then they might start looking at her differently. "I told you," she insisted. "Nothing. Other than the obvious."

"No," Stiles persisted. "There's something wrong. I know you enough to know that."

Charlie looked away from him and gave a long, shaky breath. She would tell the truth, but she would really freaking vague about it. She looked up at him, her eyes filled with hesitancy. "You may have noticed this about me be now," Charlie murmured, "but I'm not very good at being vulnerable."

Stiles's mouth dropped open in mock shock. "What?!" he exclaimed. "This is totally new information! I always thought you were a giant, fuzzy pile of hugs and love and adorable baby kittens whose ears and feet are too big for their body!" He scrunched up his face into a perplexed expression. "That metaphor might have gotten away from me."

Charlie let out a light snort and rolled her eyes before continuing. "The point is, my dad always used to tell me that life doesn't give us anything that we can't handle. You just need to be strong. No matter how much it hurts, just suck it up and—and soldier through. That's the only way you can deal with it. And that's what I did, I—I handled it. That's what I've always done. I always thought that whatever came my way, I could handle it."

Stiles's jaw twitched as he listened to her speak, his eyes filling with concern. "And now?"

"What if it's too much?" Charlie wasn't looking at him as she said the words, instead staring at her hands in her lap as she idly picked at her already nonexistent fingernails, but she felt his eyes on her, like they were boring into her skin.

"You're Charlie Oswin," he said suddenly, as if it explained something. "When life gives you lemons, you throw the lemons back in life's face and tell it to bring you something that's actually useful! And then something usually bursts into flame. It's not too much. Not for you."

Charlie's eyes fell shut and she let out a light snort. Apparently Stiles had some sort of confidence in her. And she really couldn't understand it, seeing as she didn't have it herself. "How do you know that? I'm not a freaking robot, Stiles, I can't—"

The look in his eyes suddenly shifted from complete surprise to something much softer—sympathetic, even. "Hey," he murmured, looking at her pointedly. "All that stuff that happened to you before? Your dad? You had to go through all of that by yourself. You have no idea how—I mean after my mom died if I had to—" He suddenly cut himself off, making a strange expression. "Look, all that other stuff," he continued, "you had to go through all of that alone. You've got something now you didn't have then."

"What?" Charlie asked in confusion, folding her arms across her chest and sinking lower in her seat.

"Wha—are you serious?" The look Stiles gave her next could only be described as offended. "Me," he growled, waving a finger at his own face. "I'm talking about me—you've got me."

"Oh," Charlie whispered, bobbing her head slightly. She glances at him slyly out of the corner of her eyes. "Is that supposed make me feel better?"

Stiles narrowed his eyes at her, his mouth hanging open a bit. "Wha—yes!" he spluttered, almost angrily. "That's totally supposed to make you feel better! I give support—I can support you! I—I am very, very, very supportive!" Charlie bit her lip to fight back the laugh, her face scrunching up from the effort. When Stiles saw that now familiar expression, he let out a loud scoff. "Seriously? You're seriously messing with me now? I hate you, you know that? I freaking hate you."

"Wow," Charlie exclaimed. "You're being really insensitive during a difficult time for me."

At that point Stiles's face reached a new shade of red. He shoved his fist in his mouth to block the sound of a strangled scream. And then, to Charlie's surprise, he wrapped an arm around her, pulling her in so that her head was resting on his shoulder. Charlie's stomach clenched slightly at the sudden proximity, but she didn't pull away. "What are you doing?" she whispered.

"I'm comforting you," Stiles replied bluntly. "Now deal with it."

At first it was kind of uncomfortable. Charlie sat there completely rigid, all her muscles tensed up. She was highly aware of her body and his—their proximity, where they touched, her head on his shoulder, his arm around her. It created a sort of internal anxiety. Her heart started beating a little faster and her skin was tingling slightly, like she was hyper-aware. This was why she tried to avoid feelings, especially unrequited ones. They made everything awkward, like every single action had an agenda, intentional or otherwise. Like there was a constant subtext to every word spoken or gesture made. It sucked. It sucked because it meant that she couldn't just hang out with him anymore.

But then something changed. Stiles's arm tightened around her and she relaxed into him and they were both just there. They sat that way for a long time, not saying anything or moving at all. And Charlie felt a warmth spreading through her. She did feel comforted. She felt protected. That wasn't really something she was used to feeling.

"Hold on," Stiles said suddenly. Charlie looked up to find him staring at that TV in confusion. "Since when is Angela with Damien?" he demanded, gesturing at the soap opera currently playing. "She and Richard just got engaged. They were totally in love! What happened?"

Charlie snorted and shook her head. Being stuck in that waiting area was messing with their brains. "That's not Angela," she replied. "That's her long-lost evil twin Nikki. She and Damien are gonna kill Angela, have Nikki take her place, and then steal all Richard's money."

"Wha—since when is there an evil twin?"

"That's what happens when you fall asleep for a few hours," Charlie said with a shrug.

"But they can't get rid of Angela and Richard—those two are the best part of the show!" Then Stiles seemed to hear the words coming out of his mouth because he paused, giving Charlie a sheepish look. "What? I'm invested now."

Charlie smiled and rolled her eyes. "You're an idiot."

Stiles just shrugged. "You know when you say that, it kind of sounds like a compliment."

The two of them sat like that for a long while, watching 'Giant Explosion of Romance and Murder'. Or at least that's what she thought the soap was called. And Charlie realized why they always played soap operas in hospital waiting rooms. It was a good distraction. Those shows were like Stockholm Syndrome—no matter how much you hate them, if you watch more than two episodes, you end up getting sucked in whether or not you want to. It numbs the thoughts.

As time dragged on, Stiles fell asleep again. It was actually pretty impressive, his ability to fall asleep anywhere and everywhere. And he had started drooling again. Once he was asleep, though, all those anxieties started coming back. There was nothing to distract her anymore. Charlie watched to door to Lydia's room intently, watching who exited and entered. Mrs. Martin got back with a huge cup of coffee, doctors and nurses, including Mrs. McCall, filed in and out, and some man she didn't really recognized walked in and never came out. But as soon as that man went in, Mrs. Martin left again, leaving Charlie the conclusion that she might actually meet Lydia's father. After a while she stood up again and stared at the floor as she paced back and forth. But when she finally looked up, she found Mrs. McCall walking towards her. Immediately Charlie stopped her pacing, spun on her heel and walked directly towards the woman.

"What is it?" she demanded, not letting the nurse get a word out. "How is Lydia—is she okay? What's changed?"

"Slow down," Mrs. McCall said lifting her hands in the air. "Lydia's awake. The doctors have run the usual diagnostics and she's fine. She's in some pain—she's lost a lot of blood and she's still weak, but—"

"But she's going to be okay, right?" Charlie stammered out, interrupting her. "Lydia's going to be okay?"

Mrs. McCall reached forward and grabbed both of Charlie's shoulders, forcing her to calm down. "She's fine. She's going to make a full recovery."

Charlie's shoulders sagged as some of that impossible degree of tension flooded out of her. She lunged forward and wrapped Mrs. McCall into a tight, unexpected hug. "Thank you. Thank you so much."

Mrs. McCall patted Charlie's back awkwardly. "It was my pleasure. Believe me."

Charlie released the woman and took a step back, running her hands through her hair. "Can I see her now? Please?"

Mrs. McCall nodded urgently. "Absolutely. She's ready for visitors. You can go right—"

Charlie didn't bother listening to the end of the sentence. She immediately darted around Mrs. McCall and sprinted the few yards that divided her from Lydia's room. Grabbing hold of the door handle, she wrenched it open violently, making it slam loudly into the wall. She ignored the sound, her eyes searching for the one thing she cared about at the moment.

Lydia was sitting up in bed, propped up by a few pillows. Some more color had returned to her cheeks, but she was still pale and her hair was a mess. But she had that expression on her face—the sarcastic, slightly displeased one that she should probably have patented. When Lydia saw Charlie, a look of mild relief spread across her face. "Charlie, thank God," she said with a small roll of the eyes. "Finally somebody who might actually be able to answer my question. Where are all the hot doctors—the McDreamys and McSteamys? Television has promised me hot doctors." She lifted her hands in the air and looked around questioningly. "Where are they? Because I don't see them." For the first time in what felt like years, a full grin split across her face, making Lydia wrinkle her nose at Charlie. "What's that look about," Lydia said, gesturing at her face.

Ignoring her, Charlie strode forward, brushing past that unknown man, and threw her arms around Lydia, pulling her into a tight, but careful hug. Lydia didn't hug back, leaving her arms hanging at her sides. "Um, Charlie," she trilled in that musical tone of hers. "Your arms are doing something weird."

"I'm hugging you," Charlie mumbled into her friend's shoulder. "This is a hug—we're hugging."

"Yeahhhh," Lydia drawled out, "but we don't hug."

"We do after near-death experiences," Charlie replied bluntly. She continued to hold on to Lydia, and after a few more moments she felt arms wrapping around her as well. And soon Lydia was clinging to her. As much as she tried to be that cold, unflappable, invincible fashionista, deep down she was just a scared little girl who had almost died.

It was the sound of a throat being cleared that made them finally separate. The two girls pulled apart to fins a man standing over them, his arms folded across his chest. "Sorry to interrupt this—" he pointed back and forth between the two of them before turning to Charlie "—but who are you?"

Charlie made a face at him and crossed her arms as well. "I could ask you the same thing."

The man blinked in surprise, a bit taken aback by Charlie's standoffishness. Lydia let out a loud groan. "Oh my God," she whined. "Dad, this is Charlie, my best friend. Charlie, this is my dad."

"Okay," Charlie said, nodding to herself. "I think I've seen pictures of you. I guess I didn't recognize you without the giant 'x' in red Sharpie on your face."

Mr. Martin ignored her and turned to face Lydia. Charlie watched the following interchange like it was a tennis match, her head snapping back and forth with each exchange of commentary. "Why have I never heard of her before?" Mr. Martin demanded.

Lydia quirked an eyebrow at him. "Let's go with 'proximity'. Or 'presence'. Or maybe 'lack of interest'."

"Lydia, I'm your father," he insisted. "I think I should know who you're spending your time with."

"Really?" Lydia said, looking at him with wide eyes. "Since when?"

"Since you were attacked and spent the weekend in a coma," he growled.

Lydia pursed her lips and jerked her head to the side noncommittally. "A girl needs her beauty sleep."

Charlie looked Lydia up and down, taking in the sweaty hair and remainder of eye makeup that had crusted under her eyes, and eyed her skeptically. "Really? That's what you were doing?"

Lydia turned to Charlie, smiling that 'I fantasizing about killing you' smile she sometimes wore. "Yes, Charlie," she bit out through bared teeth. "That was exactly what I was doing. And can you do me a favor? That turtleneck? Burn it. Right now. The incinerator's in the boiler room."

But Mr. Martin wasn't done yet. "Look, Lydia—"

"Dad," Lydia interrupted, flashing him a tight smile. "I think I need another blanket. Would you go get me one? They keep them way, way at the other side of the hospital. All the way on the other side."

Mr. Martin sighed in resignation and scratched absently at his forehead. Charlie almost felt bad for the guy—he was just trying to help—but she knew better than to say anything. Lydia didn't hold grudges for no reason. "Alright," he said, nodding in defeat. "You girls talk amongst yourselves. I'll be back soon."

An audible sigh of relief escaped from Lydia when the door closed behind Mr. Martin, and Charlie soon found out why. She needed answers. The trauma of what had happened to her, physical and mental, had left a giant, gaping hole in her memory after she left Stiles to find Jackson. And she was asking Charlie to fill it. Before she knew it, Charlie was lying again. Well, not lying per se, but leaving out the biggest truth of them all. As far as Lydia knew, she got attacked by an animal and Jackson found her and brought her to the hospital. That was it.

By the time her dad got back again with that entirely useless blanket, exhaustion had crept up on Lydia again. But, as Lydia did with everything, she decided to fight it, declaring that she was going to take a shower.

"You—you want help getting in the shower?" Mr. Martin asked, desperate to help in some way.

Lydia paused for a moment where she was perched on the edge of the bed. "Maybe if I was four," she bit out as she shuffled by him to the bathroom door. "And still taking bubble baths."

"R—right," Mr. Martin stammered out as she pushed past him. "I'll just wait outside then. Where it's...slightly less sarcastic."

The door to the bathroom slammed, leaving Charlie and Mr. Martin alone together. He looked at her questioningly, like she could somehow unlock the secret to Lydia's bitterness towards him. "Dude, don't look at me," she said, throwing her hands in the air. "I haven't got any explanations for you. I just got here."

Mr. Martin gave a small grunt of disappointment and turned to the door that led out into the hall and waiting area, followed immediately by Charlie. Mrs. McCall was right outside, sorting through some medication. Charlie gave her a warm smile of thanks and mouthed the words 'thank you'. Mrs. McCall returned the smile and murmured a quiet 'you're welcome' before her eyes shifted to something right over Charlie's shoulder. Mr. Martin was waving her over. "Excuse me?" He gestured towards the waiting area, indicating at none other than one Stiles Stilinski.

Charlie had to physically repress a guffaw when she observed the scene before her. Somehow in his sleep Stiles had managed to drape himself over three separate chairs, the wooden armrests digging into his back in a way that could not be comfortable. His head was sagging to the ground, his mouth was hanging open and an arm and leg were both dangling off the side of the chairs. It was kind of a miracle that he hadn't careened off the side. He kept smacking his lips and murmuring something under his breath that she couldn't quite hear.

"He's been here all night?" Mr. Martin demanded.

"He's been here all weekend," Mrs. McCall corrected. "Both of them have."

Mr. Martin's mouth opened and closed a few times, clearly confused, making Charlie roll her eyes. "I'll take care of it before the drool causes a slip hazard or something." Leaving the two adults, she strode across the waiting room and nudged his leg with the toe of her shoe. "Stiles, wake up. I've got news.

But Stiles didn't wake up. He shifted on the chairs and let out a low moaning sound. "You're dirty," he said, followed by a suggestive chuckle. The nurse who was emptying the trash right by Stiles's head gave him a strange look while Charlie's hand flew up, clapping over her mouth. Holy crap. Holy crap. It didn't take much to realize what was happening. Stiles was having a sex dream. Charlie shoved her fist in her mouth to force back the sobs of laughter. Stiles chuckled lewdly again and started unconsciously blowing kisses at the unsuspecting nurse, who now looked more than slightly perturbed by the situation.

"Don't worry," Charlie said, nodding at the woman. "I've got this."

It was Charlie's turn to be on the receiving end of a strange look. The nurse quickly collected the trash and scurried away, leaving Charlie and Stiles alone. Charlie snatched her half-empty water bottle from where she had left it under her seat, removed the cap, and upended it over Stiles's head. The reaction was instantaneous.

"Gaah! Wha—what's happening! Oh my G—Ugh!"

Stiles lifted his hands above his face, trying to protect himself from the stream being poured over him, but he just ended up fighting with the 'Get Well Soon' balloon and almost falling out of his seat. Charlie righted the water bottle again before bringing it to her lips and downing the rest of the contents. Wiping at his face, Stiles blinked the rest of the water out of his eyes.

"Rise and shine, Stilinski," Charlie sang out. "Sorry about the cold shower, but it kind of sounded like you needed it."

"Mmph—Charlie?" Stiles muttered, peering up at her. Then all of the sudden, his eyes shot open, going so wide she almost thought they were going to pop out of his head cartoon-style. Stiles began to flail about slightly as he tried to sit up straight. "Ch—Charlie! Hey, how's it going? What are you doing here? In the waiting room. Where we—where we were...waiting. And that's all."

Charlie wrinkled her nose slightly at his rambling answer, but went ahead and shrugged. "I was performing a public service," she replied lightly. "Preventing the nurses from being harassed by an unconscious sixteen-year-old."

Stiles, who was still in the process of waking up, looked up at her in confusion. "Huh?"

Charlie sighed and perched on the seat next to him. "Stiles, has anybody ever told you that you talk in your sleep?"

His mouth began opening and closing, like a fish dying on the floor of a boat. "What—what did you hear?" he asked, his eyes darting around evasively. "Not that there was anything to hear. But if you did hear something it totally, totally wasn't what it sounded like—what did you hear?"

"Oh," Charlie snorted, "I heard enough."

Stiles paled visibly. "Enough—what do you mean by that? That's, like, super-vague and anxiety provoking."

"Enough to give you crap for at least a week," Charlie said with a smirk. "Gladys looked pretty traumatized."

"Oh," he muttered. For some reason he seemed to regain his calm, or at least some of it. He was still flushed with embarrassment, but not freaking out. "Okay. That's—that's, I mean, wow, that's—that's—" He jumped up to his feet and pointed down the hall. "I'm—I'm gonna go get myself some food. Over there. Far, far away from—" he waved his hand around, indicating at the waiting area "—from right here. So, yeah. Okay, then."

With that he jumped out of his seat and careened down the hall, leaving Charlie staring after him. "Stiles!" she called out after him. "Stiles, wait! There's something I've got to—! Lydia, she—!"

But it was too late. At that point Stiles couldn't hear her and she was totally alone. Charlie let out a low groan and pulled her knees up to her chin. She drove her hands into her hair and pulled slightly, letting it be a release for her frustrations. "That's just great, Charlie," she muttered to herself. "Start teasing the guy you like about the sex dream he had. That's definitely a totally solid plan. It makes perfect sense. Why would anybody not do that?"

Letting out a loud huff, Charlie curled up in a tight ball and snuggled into the cushion of the seat. Why had she never learned to be an actual, proper human being with normal feelings, appropriate comments, and at least some degree of verbal filter? Why couldn't she just be a functional human being for half a day? It was like there was something deep, down inside of her that was just...off. She looked up at that balloon with all those smiley faces staring down at her. "What the hell are you looking at?" she muttered bitterly. "Stop smiling." She batted the balloon away from her, trying to get it to leave her alone, but it slowly floated back into place. Like it was mocking her.

She wrapped her arms around her legs, pulling them in close and rested her forehead on her knees. "I'd like to disappear now."

The seconds ticked by, and Charlie began to wonder if Stiles was actually going to come back. She began to drum her fingers against her legs impatiently, her mind going in a circular track of regret. Until something suddenly broke through it.

CRASH!

Charlie's head snapped up suddenly at the sound of crunching metal and shattering glass. "What the hell—"

Frowning in confusion, Charlie got to her feet and began moving in the direction of the noise to investigate. She passed Lydia's door and was just about to turn the corner into the next hallway when she heard something else. Something much more harrowing. An otherworldly, piercing shriek ripped through the hospital, making Charlie skid to a stop. She knew that scream.

"Lydia?!"

Turning on her heel, Charlie sprinted back down the hallway. She collided with door to the hospital room and exploded through it. She spun around, her eyes raking over every single corner of the room looking for somewhere Lydia could hide, but the room was completely empty. Then she heard the shower running and careened into the bathroom.

"Lydia?!" She ripped the shower curtain back, but all she found on the other side was an empty tub, slowly filling with clear water. The droplets from the shower head sprayed outwards and clung to her hair. Charlie slowly stepped back from the shower, and as she did, a cold gust of air hit her in the face. She turned to find herself confronted with a single window thrown wide open and leading out to a dark forest of menacing, twisted branches. Charlie ran to the window, leaning out of it as far as she could go and looking for anything—a broken branch, a discarded towel, a set of footprints—anything that could tell her where her friend went. But there was nothing. "Lydia!"

The only reply her cry received was its own echo, reverberating against that wall of trees. Her heart began to hammer in her chest and she looked up at the moon. It wasn't quite full, but she felt it staring down at her like a threat. Charlie's breaths started to come out quick and panicked and she called out again, even though she knew there would be no response. It was only when she heard the slam against the wall behind her that she finally turned around.

Stiles and Mrs. McCall had forced their way into the tiny bathroom as well, and they were both looking at her with wide eyes. It was Stiles who spoke first. "Charlie, wha—what happened."

Charlie had to suck in a few breaths before she had enough oxygen to speak the words. But the way Stiles's eyes were delving into hers, he already knew the answer. Charlie swallowed heavily and shook her head. "Lydia," she said, her voice breaking. "She's gone."

**PLEASE REVIEW/COMMENT! It makes me so happy!**

**Soundtrack Update**

**Charlie's dream, wandering around the empty hospital.**

**-~-~-~Ransom – Son Lux**

**Charlie goes to Lydia's room to visit and talks to her.**

**-~-~-The Loved Ones – Sanders Bohlke**

**Stiles comforts Charlie in the waiting room.**

**-~-~-~The Match – The Eastern Sea (I LOVE THIS SONG. And the band. I kept going back and forth between this song and another one called 'The Snow'. Seriously, give them both a listen. The lyrics kind of make me want to cry.)**

**Everybody runs into the bathroom and finds Lydia missing (picture the action in slow motion to the song; the door would open and they would find the bathroom empty at about 1:54).**

**-~-~-How'm I Supposed to Die – Civil Twilight**

**References!**

**The name of the soap ('Giant Explosion of Romance and Murder') is actually the English translation of the name of the telenovela from that episode of Psych, 'Lights, Camera, Homicidio'. That was such an awesome episode.**


	2. Into The Woods

**Disclaimer: 'Teen Wolf' isn't mine. Shocking, right? But it's true. If there are any similarities in content or dialogue, it has probably originated with the show.**

**A huge thank you to Nina the Keyblader Mistress, nessafly, EnchantingNightmares, .heaRt, katiesgotagun, heroherondaltotherescuce, .lover, easythrowaway, RedRoses5, Jaiime95, aliciasellers75, Daenerys86, Gee Brittany, lenie954, winchesterxgirl, SimplyKelly, CourtneyxWolf725, Vcarp1993, vickylopez2994, charisma26, Bookiee, TheMMMG, BriancyyD, Female whovian, Aoibhinn, Valkyrie101, HQ16, Guest 1, Sarah Jackson – The Other, Red red red ribbon, Tania, Choo plus Choo Equals Train, veronica517251, artificial-paradises, colinmochrerulestheworld, irmid-amrad-ursul, Shes-The-Proto-Type, TWsos12345, bridgetzombie, KennedyRaye, TameTheGhosts, purplemonkey36, Guest 2, nixevee, and Undeniable Weirdness for your reviews! You have no idea how much I appreciate them! And thank you to BrittWitt16 for creating your wonderful stories and inspiring mine.**

Chapter 2 – Into the Woods

"How many times to I have to tell you? I was in the waiting area. I heard a crash. I went to investigate that ridiculously loud noise. I heard Lydia scream. Then I proceeded to haul ass in the direction of that scream, ended up in the bathroom, and found the shower running, the window open, and my friend missing!"

Charlie's voice continued to rise as she spoke until soon enough she found herself screaming—probably even spitting a little bit—into the face of the guy in the uniform in front of her. She was attracting more than a few slightly alarmed stares from the lingerers—those people who mill about and leer at crime scenes in the hopes of seeing something scandalous—but she could give less than half of two shits about what any of them thought.

It hadn't taken long for the police to get there. About half a second after Stiles careened into the bathroom, his phone was out his pocket and he was talking to his dad. What followed seemed to involve lots of pencils, pads of papers, and people in khaki uniforms nodding earnestly as they took statements. A whole lot of talking. Not a lot of looking for Lydia. Charlie stood there gnawing on her fingernails and bouncing up and down on the balls of her feet as her eyes darted around. Sheriff Stilinski was talking with Mrs. McCall as Stiles stood a few feet off, trying to eavesdrop in a manner she was sure he thought was stealthy. Other officers were distributed throughout the hallway, taking statements.

Charlie knew that this was part of the process—she understood that. She understood that they needed to collect all possible information so they could move forward and make informed decisions. But Charlie wasn't the most patient of people, especially when it came to this—when it came to Lydia. She needed to be doing something, not just standing there, being totally and completely useless. She could feel herself becoming jumpier and jumpier by the second. It was like there was a pressure building up under her skin, and she was beginning to feel like she was about to explode. And it didn't help that she had been suck giving her statement to Deputy Sean, the most passive-aggressive son of a bitch in the entire sheriff's department. He still hadn't quite forgiven her for the names she had called him over their few encounters over the past few months—'Dudley Do-Right', 'Officer Krupke', and a whole lot of other more creative names that involved more than a few curse words. Which was probably why he hadn't been writing anything down the last three times she told him her story. He smirked at her and clicked his pen dramatically. "I'm sorry. I didn't quite get that. Would you mind repeating it one more time?"

If there was a look you could give someone that would light them on fire instantaneously, that would be the look Charlie gave the deputy at that moment. The bouncing of the feet and gnawing of the fingernails stopped, the eyes narrowed, and she ground her teeth together. And then she smiled. Actually, 'baring her teeth' would be a more accurate way to put it. She let out a dangerous laugh and took two small steps forward.

"Okay," she said in a sickly sweet voice. "How's about we try this again, you glorified traffic cop. I was in the waiting area. There was a crash. I went to see what it was. Lydia screamed. I ran into the bathroom. No Lydia." She held her hands in the air, signifying that she had finished. "Is that clear enough for you? Do you need me to enunciate more carefully or use shorter sentences? Do you need me to paint you a picture?" She paused and cleared her throat before waving her hands around dramatically. "We open on our heroine, calmly seated in the waiting room of the local hospital. Suddenly, a loud crash breaks the silence. She stands, and approaches the origin of the noise with hesitation—"

"Okay," a voice said, interrupting what was definitely going to turn into a long and altogether unnecessary rant. All of the sudden Stiles appeared at her side, wrapping an arm around her shoulders. "And that's enough of that," he muttered, pulling her away. "Nice to see you Sean, as always." He nodded at the deputy before turning back to Charlie and ushering her a little ways away. "Okay..." he drawled out, a little bit of sarcasm seeping into his voice. "You kind of looked like you were going to punch Sean over there in the face. I really didn't think this needed saying, but being arrested from assaulting a police officer isn't the best game plan. Like, ever."

Charlie let out a huff and came to a stop, folding her arms across her chest. "It doesn't count when the officer involved is being a total d-bag."

Stiles shot her a weird look and open and closed his mouth a few times before responding. "Yeah, I'm pretty sure it does still count."

"No it doesn't," she insisted. "It's extenuating circumstances. Excessive douchiness."

He scrunched up his face and stared at the wall behind her, blinking a lot and making that confused expression he sometimes had. "I don't—I don't think that's a thing."

"Stiles," she growled in a voice that made him shift uncomfortably. "Do I look like I'm in the mood for a reality check right about now?" She pulled the blanket one of the nurses had draped over her shoulders, balled it up, and chucked it on the floor next to her. "And why the hell does everybody keep putting blankets on me? I'm not cold—I don't need a freaking blanket!" At that moment another nurse walked forwards carrying another fleecy blanket, but before the woman could get another step forward, Charlie threw a hand up in the air, making her stop. "Don't, Gladys. Seriously, just don't."

The woman blinked at Charlie's unintentionally harsh response and spun on her heel, marching the other direction. Stiles grabbed Charlie's shoulder, making her face him. "Okay, one," he said, holding up a finger in her face, "I'm pretty sure her name wasn't Gladys. Two, don't you think you're overreacting. Just a little bit?"

"No." Stiles looked at her skeptically, and she blew out a long breath and shrugged. "Okay, fine, yes. Just a little bit. But seriously, what the hell is it with the blanket?"

"It's a shock blanket," he answered. "They give them to people when they're in shock."

Charlie made a face at him. "Why?"

"Nobody knows," Stiles said with a noncommittal jerk of the head.

Charlie let out a loud groan and ran her hands down her face. "What are we supposed to do here, Stiles?" she demanded, her voice coming out panicked. "Because I've been racking my brain here, and I've got no freaking idea."

Stiles's face fell. Not that he had been happy about anything to begin with, but he had been able to block it out some. He let out a long sigh and ran his hands down his face before grabbing her shoulders and forcing Charlie to look at him. "It's gonna be okay," he murmured. "I called Scott—he's already on his way. We're gonna find Lydia and everything's going to end up okay." Charlie bit her lip and broke the eye contact, opting instead to stare at some tiles. Stiles gripped her shoulders a little tighter, making her look him in the eye again. "Do you trust me?"

It was a complicated question. Charlie didn't really trust easily. In fact, she wasn't even really sure if she knew what the word meant in the practical sense. As an abstract concept she understood it, but in reality...how could she define it? She didn't know. But if she ever came close to trusting somebody, it was Stiles. So she nodded. "Yeah. Yeah, I trust you."

Stiles released her shoulders and gave a definitive nod. "Okay, then. Trust me when I say we're gonna get her back. Now that we're done with that, can we please start being productive and go eavesdrop on my dad?" Charlie pressed her lips together and nodded again, and something close to a smile appeared on Stiles's face. "Great."

Stiles raised his hand for a high-five, but Charlie's arms stayed down by her sides. "Seriously?" she demanded raising her eyebrows at him.

A slight frown formed on Stiles's face as he looked back and forth between her and his hand. "Yeah," he said, pointing at his own raised hand. "This kind of undercuts the seriousness of the moment, doesn't it? I'm gonna go ahead and put that back down." With his other hand, he grabbed the raised one and pulled it out of the air, back down to his side. "We'll just save the high-fives for later."

A little ways down the hall, Mr. Martin had joined Mrs. McCall and the sheriff, along with another deputy Charlie didn't recognize. The pair crept closer, crouching down and staying close to the walls. All in all it was a degree of stealth that was probably unnecessary, but it felt appropriate in the moment. "You checked the whole hospital, right?" the sheriff inquired, looking earnestly at Mrs. McCall.

"Every last corner," Mrs. McCall replied with a definitive nod.

"Nothing suspicious?"

"Nothing," Mrs. McCall repeated, looking to Mr. Martin for confirmation. "She just took off."

"Alright," the sheriff said, turning to another one of his deputies. "Let's get an APB out on a sixteen-year old redhead." He looked back to Mrs. McCall and Mr. Martin inquiringly. "Any other descriptors?"

All of the sudden, Stiles abandoned all attempts at subtlety and burst into the conversation. "Five foot three, green eyes, fair skin, and her hair's actually strawberry blonde," he blurted out. Then he glanced at Charlie, a strange and slightly scared looking expression covering his face. "Or just red. Red's fine. It's definitely got a red—" he started waving his hand around his head, indicating at his own close-cropped hair "—it's a generally reddish hue."

"What are you doing?" Charlie hissed, walking up as well.

"I have no idea," he muttered back.

Charlie rolled her eyes slightly and turned to the sheriff. "I think the fact that she's got green eyes will kind of be overshadowed by the fact that she's naked and has a giant wound in her side."

The sheriff stared at the two of them, the expression on his face a mixture of disbelief and frustration. "Is that so?" he asked, glancing between the two of them. Charlie and Stiles looked at each other for confirmation before turning back to the sheriff and nodding. The sheriff smiled humorously and nodded back. "Okay." He grabbed Stiles by the back of neck and dragged him a few feet off, making Charlie follow after them. "Stiles," the sheriff whispered harshly, "what the hell are you still doing here?"

"Um, providing moral support," Stiles stammered back, the sentence sounding more like a question than anything else.

"Really?" the sheriff asked in a sarcastic tone. "Who exactly are you supporting?"

"That'd be me," Charlie said, raising her hand a bit. "He's the wind beneath my wings."

The sheriff gave Charlie a strange look before turning back to his son. "How about you provide your ass back home where you should be," he growled. "And take her with you. There's nothing else you can do here. Go home. Get some sleep."

"Sure," Stiles said, bobbing his head as he spoke. "Yeah, sure. I will absolutely, definitely be doing that. With no deviations whatsoever."

The sheriff just sighed and scratched at his forehead. "Get out of my sight."

"You got it!"

With that Stiles scurried past his father, pausing for a moment so Charlie could catch up with him. As they rounded the corner, she found herself confronted with a collapsed vending machine. "Who killed Bob?" she asked, craning her neck at the scene as they passed it by.

"I have absolutely no idea," Stiles replied a little too quickly.

It felt strange to be leaving the hospital. She had eaten, slept, and even showered there for the past couple of days. Hell, she hadn't even been outside since she stepped in through those doors in the first place. She had lost all sense of time caught in that windowless waiting room, basking in the fluorescent lighting. She wasn't even sure it was night until she stepped through the front doors. Stepping back into the real world kind of required a readjustment. The two of them stepped through those double doors and into the cold night air. Charlie took a deep breath, grateful to finally be out of the stale hospital air.

"Alright," he continued as they marched towards the parking lot. "So Scott texted back. He's in the parking lot. You don't have to worry—we're gonna find her."

"How exactly?" Charlie demanded, trying to keep up with his almost impossibly fast pace. "She's been gone for over an hour! She could be pretty much anywhere by now."

"Exactly, which is why—" he reached into his jacket and pulled out a rumpled wad of fabric "—I got this."

Frowning to herself, Charlie grabbed the fabric and unbunched it. It was faded and blue except for an angry stain of blackened blood. "Lydia's hospital gown? Where did you get this?"

"I swiped it from the bathroom while everyone was looking for her," he replied. "Scott's gonna use it to track her by scent."

"Scott's going to sniff Lydia's clothes?" she demanded skeptically.

Stiles let out a loud groan and shook his head at her. "Why do you have to try and make it sound all creepy?"

"I didn't have to try," she shot back. "I literally just described what he's about to do."

"Well that's the plan," Stiles barreled on. "Now come on. The Jeep's over here."

Charlie let out a long, shaky breath before following him in the direction of the car. She wasn't equipped for this. If there was one thing she didn't know how to do, it was nothing. And that's what she was doing right now. Nothing. Lydia was wandering around in the woods, cold, naked, and alone, and there wasn't a damn thing Charlie could do about it. Except apparently let Scott sniff her hospital gown. Her stomach was twisting itself into a knot.

She needed to lock it down. She needed to lock it all down. She wouldn't be any good to Lydia if she let this get to her. A big, big part of her wanted to lie on the floor of her bedroom curled up in ball and listening to 'Blackbird' by the Beatles on a loop, but that part was useless. "Suck it up, Oswin," she whispered to herself. "You've got work to do."

When they finally got to the Jeep, Scott was already sitting inside. As they approached, he nodded in greeting, but the expression on his face stayed solemn. Stiles strode forwards and opened the door, allowing Charlie to scramble in, almost doing a back flip in her attempt to get to that back seat. "Did you get it?" Scott asked, as Stiles slid into the seat next to him.

Stiles sighed and slammed the door shut. "Who do you think you're talking to right now? Of course I got it."

Charlie leaned forwards over the seat and dropped the hospital gown on Scott's lap. "There you go," she sighed out, collapsing back in the seat. "I have a feeling things are about to start getting weird."

"So this is the one she was just wearing?" Scott asked.

Stiles nodded and then looked back at Charlie, like he was checking up on her or something. She folded her arms across her chest and sank a little lower in her seat. She wasn't used to that—having other people look after her like that. Scott glanced back and forth between the two of them a few times before twisting around in his seat as well. He stared at her with those big, brown, earnest eyes of his. "Hey, we're gonna find her, Charlie," he murmured comfortingly. "I'm not going to let anything happen to her. I'm not going to let anyone hurt her. Not again."

Charlie pressed her lips together into a wan smile. She honestly wasn't sure how to respond to all of the assurances. "Thanks."

"I'm serious," Scott pressed. "Nothing is going to happen to her." He sighed and scratched absently at his forehead. "And I'm sorry about Allison. I—I tried to get her to call you back, but she—"

"Yeah, I know," Charlie said, cutting him off. "It's okay. It's not your fault."

"Yes it is," Scott insisted. "You were keeping my secret. She's mad at you because of me. I never meant for any of that to happen. I'm really, really sorry."

Charlie smiled again, and this time it was genuine. "Look, Scott, I knew what I was getting myself into at the beginning."

"Really?" Stiles interrupted with a scoff. "You knew that you were going to end up emptying a gun into the torso of a giant, wacked out, eight-foot-tall wolf-monster."

Charlie swung her head around and stared at Stiles through narrowed eyes. "Stiles, not helpful." She turned back to Scott and barreled on. "The point is that I knew Allison would find out eventually, and I knew this might happen. It's not on you. Got it?" Scott's jaw twitched slightly, but he seemed to accept what she was saying because he nodded as well. "Okay. Now that we've got all that out of the way, can we please find Lydia now? Go on, Scott. Sniff her clothes."

Scott winced at the wording and Stiles let out a loud groan. "What did I tell you," he said looking at her accusingly. "I said not to make it weird. You just made it weird." He sighed heavily and snatched the hospital gown from Scott, waving it in his face. "Okay, just shove the thing in your face and let's find her."

Scott raised the bundle of clothes to his face and inhaled deeply while Stiles shoved his keys in the ignition, twisting them almost violently and making the car rev to life. Charlie held her hands in her lap, picking at her fingernails until she hit the quick. Every second that passed by, Lydia was getting further away. It was getting more difficult to find her. And there were so many things that could be in those woods. There was a time when all Charlie would have to worry about was coyotes and exposure to the elements, but now...who knew what could be out there? There were monsters in the dark.

Squeezing her eyes shut, Charlie listened to the revving of the car engine. That might as well have been the sound of her breathing. Taking a deep breath, Charlie opened her eyes again, and she found herself staring at her own reflection in the rearview mirror. All of the sudden a small voice rang in her head—one that sounded like Lydia. _Never frown, Charlie. Somebody could be falling in love with your smile_. Well Charlie didn't feel much like smiling at the moment, but if there was one thing she was really, really good at, it was denial. She leaned forwards, sticking her head between the two boys. "You know, Scott, something just occurred to me. If you became a cop, you could be a policeman who is his own police dog. How cool would that be?"

"Has anybody told you that you deflect tension and anxiety with humor," Stiles mumbled. "Like, a lot."

"Just you and my shrink," Charlie sighed. She collapsed back in the seat and stared out in front of her, through the windshield in front of her. For some reason she focused in on the sign in front of her. 'Beacon Hills Hospital'. Hospital. The place people were supposed to go to get better. Back in the real world—the one that had rules that actually made sense. Charlie had been trying really, really hard to make things make sense. Sometimes she could. She could still apply logic, she could still understand motivations and make connections. She could still figure out the puzzles. The problem was she didn't have the tools to figure it out. The rulebook had changed.

All of the sudden, Stiles's face appeared, blocking her view of the hospital. "Hey. We're going to find her."

Charlie pulled her knees up to her chest and wrapped her arms around them, perching her chin on her knees. "I know," she said with all the false confidence in the world. She raised her eyebrows at him pointedly. "Can we get on with it now?"

Stiles knew her well enough by now to know that she wasn't being harsh. She got the distinct impression that he saw straight through her. Straight through all of it. And that scared her more than a little bit. Because, honestly, if he looked too close she wasn't sure he'd like what he saw. But for now he seemed to approve, enough not to be scared away by the complete mess that was Charlie Oswin at least. Enough to be friends. Stiles didn't smile, but his eyes crinkled at the corners a bit, giving her a reassuring look. "Alright. Let's get on with it." He swung his head around to look at Scott, whose face was still buried in that wad of fabric. "Have you got it yet?"

Scott removed the fabric from his face before glancing at the two of them before nodding. "Yeah. Yeah, I've got it."

"Then let's go!" Stiles exclaimed. He made a move to back out of the parking spot and switched on the headlights. They cut through the dark, illuminating a figure in front of them. Stiles jumped in his seat and let out a strangled yelp of surprise. "Wow!"

It was Allison. She was standing in front of the car, literally like a deer in headlights. It was the first time Charlie had seen the girl since they parted ways at the house. She hadn't been to the hospital at all, probably because her parents had gotten even more overly protective than they had been before. And she had just lost her aunt...Allison was not having an easy time. Normally Charlie would try and help—show up in her pajamas with a tub of ice cream and a couple of romcoms—but Allison didn't want to be made to feel better. Not by Charlie at least. Charlie could see the worry in her face. There was a line between her

Allison circled around the car and came up next to Scott's window. He quickly rolled it down, a worried expression on his face. "What are you doing here?" he whispered urgently. "Somebody's gonna see us!"

"I don't care," Allison whispered back. "She's my best friend and we need to find her before they do."

"I can find her before the cops can," Scott assured her.

Allison exhaled sharply and shook her head almost imperceptibly. "How about before my father does?"

"He knows?" Stiles demanded.

"Yeah," she said, nodding nervously. "I saw him and three other guys get into two SUVs."

"Search party," Scott murmured, glancing back at Stiles with concern.

"More like hunting party," Allison amended.

Charlie's hands involuntarily balled themselves up into fists, so tight that even her bitten fingernails dug into the skin of her palm. The Argents were after Lydia. She wasn't a werewolf. She couldn't be—the wound hadn't healed yet. That's what happened when you turned into the werewolf. But she hadn't died either. That meant that she was something new. Charlie still didn't know Mr. Argent all that well, but he didn't strike her as the type of man who embraced uncertainty. And she didn't trust his dedication to the code enough to rule out the possibility of him killing Lydia. Especially after what had happened to Kate.

Scott reached over and grabbed the latch, swinging the door wide open. "Get in."

Allison nodded and made a move to get in the car, but stopped suddenly as her eyes travelled past Scott and Stiles to the back seat, finally falling on Charlie. Charlie tried to smile and held up a hand in an awkward wave, making Allison's face visibly darken. Narrowed eyes and twitching jaw—Charlie knew that Allison wasn't happy to see her. She turned back to Scott. "What is she doing here?" she asked in a whisper Charlie was probably meant to hear.

Scott glanced back and forth between the two girls, clearly uncomfortable with the situation. "Allison, please—"

"Same as you," Charlie replied, a bit of an edge in her voice. "Looking for Lydia." She didn't know why she suddenly felt so defensive. It was her fault—she was in the wrong here. She was the reason Lydia was now roaming around the woods—Charlie knew that. But having someone else think it—having Allison hate her for it—suddenly made her clam up. The two of them just stared at each other, neither blinking, neither backing down. It turned into some bizarre staring contest, and the both of them were determined to win. Like if they won that contest, they would win the fight—they would be the one justified in their actions. The tension was thick, like the air was crackling with static electricity. That is, until a hand appeared between the two of them, waving frantically.

"Um, hello?" Stiles's voice interrupted, drawing their attention away from each other. "As much as I would love to see two hot girls getting into a catfight, we've kinda got other things to deal with. Time sensitive things. Allison, get in the car."

Allison exhaled sharply, but inclined her head in assent. Scott shifted slightly allowing Allison to clamber in. It took a comically ridiculous amount of effort, but soon enough she found herself in the back seat next to Charlie. Stiles quickly threw the Jeep into reverse and backed out of the parking spot. Moments later they were bumping along the dark road with Scott sticking his head out the window, sniffing at the crisp night air. The ridiculousness of it would have been funny if the situation wasn't so dire.

The silence in the car was oppressive, mostly because it only emphasized the hostility that was rolling off Allison in waves. Charlie stole some sidelong glances at Allison, trying to gauge her mood. The jaw was set, the eyes were narrowed, and the arms were folded tightly across her chest. The girl was staring straight in front of her, determined not to look at Charlie. Completely closed off. And when Charlie saw something she that didn't want to open up, she poked it until it did.

"So what's all this about you and Scott not being able to be seen together?" she prodded. Allison didn't respond. She shifted in her seat and her arms tightened even more around her waist, but she didn't so much as glance in Charlie's direction. Charlie blew out a long breath and stared out at the road in front of her. "Great," she bit out sarcastically. "Good talk. We should share our feelings like this more often."

At the words 'share our feelings' Allison let out a bitter snort, making Stiles groan loudly from the front seat. "Oh my God! You guys have some serious communication issues, you know that? Charlie, Scott and Allison can't be seen together or Allison's dad is going to go all Rambo on Scott's ass, so they are now nighttime lovers."

The irony of the situation smacked Charlie hard in the face. Maybe under normal circumstances—if she hadn't been riddled with anxiety—she would have just let it go. She would have just let it roll off her back. But she felt like a cornered animal, and cornered animals had a tendency to lash out. "Let me get this straight," she said, enunciating the words carefully. "You are currently lying to people that you care about, to protect someone else that you care about. Some of that sounds familiar."

"That's not the same," Allison snapped. "That is so not the same."

"How is it not the same?!" Charlie demanded, waving her hands around a bit. "It's the exact same motivation."

"No, it's not!" Allison practically shouted, glaring Charlie down.

The frustration was coming to a boiling point. Charlie had been working so hard to keep it all in she felt like she was about to explode. And then she did. "You forgave Scott!" Charlie shot back. "You forgave your parents! They told all the same lies I did! I never knew anything more than Scott did—not ever! Hell, I knew less than he did most of the time!"

"That's not the point, Charlie!" Allison replied. "I knew Scott was lying! I knew my parents were lying! And do you know who I turned to—who I chose to trust with that? You! I picked you! Every time I wondered what was happening or why people were lying to me, I turned to you! Because, honestly? You were the one person I thought would tell me the truth. You listened to me cry over Scott over and over—looking for some sort of explanation—and you had all the answers! But you still didn't say anything! I trusted you. And you betrayed that trust."

Charlie blinked in the face of the sudden onslaught. It was like she was sitting back and watching past scenes from her life on a television screen—all those times Allison had cried or wondered. Charlie had wanted to say something, but she couldn't. Any frustration she had been feeling broke in half like a dried twig and every feeling of guilt she had felt then was magnified a hundred times as she stared into Allison's now watery eyes. It felt like she had been kicked in the gut. "I didn't...I didn't have a choice," Charlie whispered, all the indignation leaving her voice. "I would have told you if I could, but I didn't have a choice."

Allison's hostility faltered in the face of Charlie's genuine regret, but it didn't fade entirely. "There's always a choice," she said bitterly.

It felt like Charlie's heart plummeted into her stomach. She had no idea why, but she had expected it to all just go away—that Allison would take her time being mad and then get over it. And then Lydia would heal and everything would go back to the way it was. This was the first time it even occurred to her that that might not happen. Things might never get back to the way they were. And Allison might never stop hating her. That now familiar ache was beginning to form behind Charlie's eyes again. The tears were coming again.

No. She rejected the tears. She was not a freaking leaky faucet. She was Charlie Oswin, and apparently that meant something. She let out a long shaky breath and opened her eyes again, only to find herself looking directly into another pair of maple brown eyes, and they were filled with concern. Stiles was watching her in the rearview mirror. Time to suck it up. Charlie forced the tears and offered up a wan smile, trying to reassure him that she was okay. He didn't seem to buy it, though.

"Okay, we can have 'sharing time' later," Stiles interjected from the front seat. "For now how's about we play nice and cooperate? For Lydia? Is that something the two of you think you can do?"

Both of the girls glanced at each other before nodding in reluctant agreement. "Yes," they muttered simultaneously.

Stiles nodded and glanced at Charlie one last time before staring out at the road in front of him. He drummed his fingers against the steering wheel as the car zipped down the road. He leaned to the side so that he was closer to Scott. "Hey, buddy! How are we doing?!"

"Just keep going down this road!" Scott yelled back. The car lurched forwards, picking up speed. They were far, far away from the hospital by that point. Sure Lydia had about an hour on them, but Charlie didn't see any way she could have gotten out this far—not on foot. Not on human feet anyway.

Curling herself into a tight little ball, Charlie stared out the window, into the dark. Every little shadow made her stomach do a somersault like, for some reason, she kept expecting Lydia to just appear on the side of the road. She nervously ran her fingers through her hair, fiddling with the ends of it. She let out a long sigh, and looked over at Allison. Stiles was right. She had to focus and cooperate, and they needed more information.

"So what exactly is going on in the Argent family home?" Charlie finally asked. "You said four people went out on the search. Are there any other indications of what might be going on, or what might have happened to Lydia? Anything out of the ordinary? Or more out of the ordinary that usual?"

Allison pressed her lips together in a thin line and shook her head. "Don't know."

"I'm not asking for me," Charlie murmured. I'm asking for Lydia."

"Charlie, I really don't know," Allison insisted.

"If Lydia's turning, do you think they'll really kill her?" Stiles asked urgently.

"They won't tell me anything, okay? All they say is 'we'll talk after Kate's funeral, when the _others_ get here'."

"Well that's suitably vague and disturbing," Charlie muttered, curling up even tighter.

"Yeah, seriously," Stiles piled on. "What others?"

"They won't tell me that either," Allison said quickly. Her anxiety seemed to be growing as she spoke. She began gnawing on her fingernails and her eyes were darting around like she was expecting someone to jump out at her out of the shadows.

"You know what, your family's got some pretty serious communication issues to work on too," he called back at her. Allison let out a snort and rolled her eyes in agreement. Stiles looked back over at Scott, whose head was still hanging out the window. "Scott, are we going in the right direction?!"

"Take the next right!" Scott shouted back over the howling of the wind outside the car.

Stiles yanked hard on the steering wheel. Charlie was pretty sure she felt the wheels of the car actually lift off the road as it moved in an almost perfect ninety degree angle. The rubber screeched against the asphalt and she was fairly certain that if they came back during the day, they would find black streaks on the ground.

Lydia wasn't a werewolf. Charlie simply refused to believe that she was turning. First of all, none of what had happened to Scott had happened to her. His wound healed. Hers didn't. And as far as she knew, he didn't go wandering around in the woods right after he was turned. And Lydia hadn't shown any signs of heightened senses. Plus the idea of Lydia as a werewolf was just wrong. Growing claws and sprouting hair out of her cheeks? There was no way any of that was compatible with her personality. And what the hell would growing claws do to a manicure? Nope. No. That was not a plausible option. Lydia couldn't be a werewolf. But that didn't mean that she hadn't turned into something else...

Left. Right. Left. Left. Right. The way Stiles took the corners kind of made Charlie feel like she was on a rollercoaster. Her stomach lurched a bit every time she turned. That is until she realized where they were going and then her stomach had a completely different reason to lurch. They were slowly moving away from the main part of the city, deeper into the woods. Closer and closer to one specific part of the woods.

"Hey, Charlie," Stiles called out over his shoulder, his voice uncertain. "Are we going where I think we're going?"

A humorless snort forced its way out of Charlie's nose. She leaned forwards and rested her chin on Stiles's seat in front of her next to the headrest so that her face was near his. "Yup," she murmured into his ear. "We are going exactly where you think we're going."

Stiles twitched when he realized her proximity and cleared his throat, but recovered quickly. "Well—well that's just great," he stammered out. "That's just fan-freaking-tastic."

All of the sudden Allison's head appeared on Stiles's other side making him jump again. "What are you talking about? Where are we going?"

One more look was exchanged between Stiles and Charlie, and the car picked up a little more speed. Charlie held on tight to keep herself from being thrown about as the car flew down that tiny, unpaved road, silently praying that Stiles didn't lose one of his side mirrors to the encroaching trees. The headlights cut through the black, giving them a full view of what lay ahead. The trees formed a wall around the road, almost guiding their path, making Charlie feel a bit like they were rats running a maze while some giant, bespectacled, all knowing scientist stood over them with a clip board taking notes. They had no choice but to follow that one path given them, and hope they would find the cheese they were looking for. Shit, her metaphors really were getting out of control. If Lydia knew Charlie had just compared her to cheese, she would be getting her ass kicked right about now. Verbally, of course.

The Hale house. Charlie wasn't quite sure how, but it looked even more terrifying than it used to. It was like the events of a few nights had changed it somehow, hanging around like an evil aura or a bad smell. The evidence of what happened that night was still all around her—the holes in the trees and the siding of the house from where the bullets struck, the bits of crime scene tape from where the cops had cordoned off the area, and Charlie swore that the acrid scent of burning fur still filled her nose.

The four of them parked a little ways down the road, approaching the house with caution. There really wasn't any way to predict what they might find there—Derek, Lydia, a group of hunters. Charlie's steps became smaller as she approached the tree line, her eyes darting about and looking for anybody else who might be in that clearing. It was empty, but somehow that didn't make her feel any better. She had never been one to believe in haunted houses, but now the possibility was seeming a hell of a lot more plausible. And if she had to pick out a single house that was probably haunted, it would definitely be the one she was staring at right now.

"So she came here," Stiles asked, eyeing Scott carefully. "You're sure?"

"Yeah," Scott murmured. His eyes were roving around, looking for any hint of a clue. "This is where the scent leads."

Stiles took a few steps closer to the house before coming to a stop and letting out a loud sigh. "Seriously, has Lydia ever been here?"

"Not with me," Allison said with a shake of the head.

All eyes turned to Charlie. She shrugged and jerked her head to the side slightly, indicating a negative. "Not with me either. This isn't exactly a spa getaway." She exhaled sharply and eyed the house, feeling a sense of unease wash over her. "But why would she come here," Charlie murmured. "I don't think Lydia even knows 'here' exists. This doesn't make any sense. What would she expect to find here?"

"Maybe she came here on instinct," Allison threw in. "Like she was looking for Derek."

"You mean looking for an alpha," Scott elaborated.

Allison nodded. "Wolves need a pack, right?"

"Not all of them," Scott replied, somewhat defensively.

"But Derek's not here," Charlie replied. She spun slowly as she walked, taking in the full 360 degree view of the area. "The cops were literally here yesterday combing over every inch of this place. He might have just had his name cleared after that stunt Mr. Argent pulled with the necklace, but I can guarantee you he won't be living here for at least a week. He's way too used to running for that."

"Since when do you know Derek so well?" Stiles demanded with a bit of an edge in his voice.

Charlie turned in the direction of his voice to find him crouching low, staring at one point in particular on the ground. Frowning curiously, she moved towards him. "It's not like we're pen pals or anything," she said as she approached. "I just understand the guy."

The only response she got was a loud harrumph, indicating that Stiles still wasn't too thrilled with the topic at hand.

"She's not wrong," Scott's voice chimed in. "I can't find Derek's scent anywhere. He hasn't been here for a while."

"But wouldn't Lydia be drawn to an alpha?" Allison insisted. "Is it an instinct to be part of a pack?"

Charlie didn't have to see Scott to know the expression on his face. It was like she could physically feel his reluctance. "Yeah...we're—we're stronger in packs."

"Like strength in numbers," Allison continued, trying to get as much information as possible.

"Uh, no," Scott mumbled. "Not like that. It's like literally stronger, faster, better in every way."

"Basically werewolves are just super co-dependent," Charlie called out over her shoulder. "You might want to keep that in mind, Allison. If you're not careful Scott's going to start getting super clingy and say things like 'you are my strength'. And trust me, none of us wants that to happen."

Then Charlie heard a light, feminine snort from somewhere behind her. She whipped her head around, looking over her shoulder, only to see Allison covering her mouth and trying to force back laughter. A small smile pulled at the corner of Charlie's lips. Finally she made Allison do something other than scowl. Until Allison caught her eye and the laughter stopped abruptly. Clearing her throat, Allison turned back to Scott. "Is that the same for an alpha? With the increased strength thing?"

"Yeah," Scott said, getting visibly nervous at the thought. "That'll make Derek stronger too."

Would Derek gaining more strength be such a bad thing? Charlie honestly didn't know. She understood him on a certain level—the two of them had spent pretty much the entirety of their lives as loners, always on the move—but she couldn't say she was certain what he was capable of. He wasn't Peter, that was for damn sure. But he wasn't going to disappear into a corner either. No. Derek had lost all his family now, and Charlie was pretty sure he was going to try and build a new one. And that wasn't necessarily good news for them.

Shaking her head, Charlie banished all those thoughts from her head. That was something she could think about later. Now they just needed to find Lydia. Instead she turned her attention back to Stiles who was squinting down at something. "Hey," she whispered, crouching down next to him. "What are we looking at?"

Stiles glanced up at her and suddenly their faces were inches apart. Suddenly Charlie realized that she was holding her breath. She felt a slight flush creeping up her neck, but didn't move. The dark was enough to conceal anything like that. Stiles blinked in surprise at their sudden closeness and swallowed a bit. "Uh, um, not sure," he stammered out, turning back and staring at the leaves in front of him. "I, uh, I though I saw..."

His voice trailed off slightly as he brushed at the leaves. Suddenly, Charlie saw something metallic gleaming in the moonlight. "Wait a second..."

Almost at the same time, the two of them reached out and their hands met a bit of thin wire. It felt cold in her hands. The two of them glanced at each other for about half a second before Stiles turned and called out over his shoulder. "Ooh, hey, look at this." Allison wandered over to investigate while Scott kept watch. "Do you see this?"

Allison crouched down on Stiles's other side, peering down at the thing. "What is it?" she asked quietly.

"Tripwire," Stiles and Charlie answered simultaneously. She turned to Stiles, no small measure of excitement in her eyes. "Dude," she whispered dramatically. "Pull it."

Stiles let out a tiny, vaguely gleeful laugh, and shifted the wire ever-so-slightly. There was a mechanical clicking noise that promised something awesome and then...nothing. No giant net that suddenly scooped them up and left them suspended from a tree, no sudden barrage of flaming arrows, no Indiana Jones-style boulder that suddenly threatened to crush them all to bits. All in all it was a little disappointing. That is, until she heard the muffled sounds of struggling behind her, followed by Scott's disembodied voice.

"Uh, guys?"

"Yeah, buddy?" Stiles said as the three of them turned around to look at him. What they saw made Charlie's hand fly to her mouth to stifle the involuntary laughter. "Oh," Stiles said weakly as they surveyed the consequences of their actions.

Scott was a few feet off, exactly where he had been standing before. Except for the small detail that he was now upside down, suspended from a tree. He smirked at them, despite the fact that all of the arms and legs not currently imprisoned were now flailing about in a way that should never be attributed to someone who supposedly had superhuman powers of coordination.

"Hey there, Scott," she said weakly. "How're you doing?"

Scott let out a chuckle and glanced up at his entangled foot. "Next time you find a tripwire...don't trip it."

"Uh, yeah," Stiles said, bobbing his head. "Noted."

"Oh, come on, Scott," Charlie whined loudly. "If we never tripped the trip wire, then how would we get to have beautiful moments like this?" She reached into the pocket of her jacket and pulled out her iPhone, toggling through the functions until she found the video recorder. She backed up a bit, so she could get him entirely into frame. "There we go, Scott," she said, an evil grin forming on her face. "Work the camera. Work it. Give us your best 'Blue Steel'." Scott glared back at her with narrowed eyes. "Stop being such a sour wolf," Charlie pouted. "Give us a smile. Let's see those glorious chompers of yours. Make your orthodontist proud."

All she received in return was a scowl. A scowl that was betrayed by the fact that his lips quirked upwards at the corners. Or downwards, given his current position. "Would you just let me down already?"

Charlie let out a snort and she, Stiles, and Allison all stepped forwards to make some sort of effort to get Scott free. Though Charlie wasn't really done watching him dangle. But they were busy, and Scott ending up in a hastily laid hunters trap at least one more time was pretty much inevitable. She would get her sequel. She stowed her phone and began to reach up to help the others, but before any of them had the chance to get him down, his ears pricked. His head snapped around, but his eyes didn't focus on anything in particular, like his was listening to something.

"Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait!" he hissed urgently, waving his hands around to make them stop. The three of them stopped, wondering what the hell was going on and glancing at each other surreptitiously like they were cheating on a quiz.

"Okay, buddy," Stiles whispered. "You're kinda giving us some mixed messages here."

"Someone's coming!"

Charlie, Stiles, and Allison just stood there stupidly, wondering what to do with the information. Scott looked between the three of them, eyes wide with disbelief. "G—go! Hide! Go!"

"What about you!" Charlie whispered back.

"Forget it—just go!"

With that, she, Stiles, and Allison all darted back towards the tree line, slipping slightly on the layers of dead leaves as they moved. The ground sloped downwards, giving whoever was approaching the vantage point. Which meant they had to hide, and fast. Allison darted behind one tree, pressing her back against the surface. Charlie's eyes darted about, looking for the best place to hide, but before she could make up her mind another hand circled around hers, yanking her off to the side behind another tree. She and Stiles pressed themselves against the tree, trying to be as small as possible. She actually kind of felt like Stiles was trying protect her. Her back was pressed against his front, and he was almost wrapped around her, trying to shield her against anything that might try and attack them. Charlie probably would have started to feel that flush creeping up her neck again if she wasn't so freaked out at the moment. Charlie squinted into the black night until her eyes began to ache, but all she would make out was four figures in dark clothing.

"Scott."

Charlie recognized that voice. It was Mr. Argent's voice. Though she probably should have expected as much. Charlie swore under her breath only to feel Stiles poke her hard in the ribs, trying to get her to be quiet.

"Mr. Argent," Scott said sheepishly. His voice was oddly nasal with him hanging upside down and all the blood was rushing to his head.

Biting onto her lip to forcibly keep herself quiet, Charlie peeked around the corner of the tree. Mr. Argent was crouching down in front of him, so the two of them were staring at each other in one of the more bizarre standoffs Charlie had ever witnessed, while the other three nameless goons hung back. Mr. Argent exhaled in a sound of mild amusement, perfectly at ease in the situation. "How are you doing?"

"Good," Scott said, nodding to himself and trying to sound as casual as possible. "You know...hanging out..." Charlie let out a snort that was probably a little too loud, earning herself another poke in the ribs from Stiles. "Is this one of yours?" Scott continued, gesturing at his bound ankle. "It's, uh, good. Nice design. Very constricting."

Mr. Argent let out a soft sigh, and all of the sudden any humor that might have existed faded away in an instant. "What are you doing out here, Scott?"

"Looking for my friend," he murmured softly.

Mr. Argent sighed, and a smile appeared on his face that was simultaneously mournful and menacing. "Ah, that's right. Lydia's in your group now, isn't she? Part of the clique? Is that the word you use? Or is there another way to put it...? Part of your _pack_?

"Actually 'clique' sounds about right to me," Scott mumbled in reply.

"I hope so," Mr. Argent replied immediately. "Because I know she's a friend of Allison's and one special circumstance such as yourself? One I can handle. Not two."

Charlie felt all of her muscles tighten instinctively at the hint of a threat. Her hands balled up into fists. Maybe it was her instinctive desire to punch him in the face. She felt like hitting a lot of people in the face these days. Stiles seemed to sense the sudden shift in her demeanor, because he gripped her arm and squeezed it comfortingly. She felt herself relax a little bit, but her body was still tense, like it wanted to fight.

"Scott do you know what a hemicorporectomy is?" Mr. Argent asked. His voice was soft, but to Charlie it almost sounded as if he was screaming. The amount of authority contained in every syllable made the words ring in her ears.

"I have a feeling I don't want to," Scott replied cheekily.

"Medical term for amputating someone at the waist. Cutting them in half. It takes a tremendous amount of strength to cut through tissue and bone like that." He reached up, drawing a line against Scott's middle, moving it as you would a saw. At the motion, Stiles's hand on Charlie's arm tightened even more, and she covered it with her own. "Let's hope a demonstration doesn't become necessary."

With that, Mr. Argent got to his feet and walked back into the trees, the other goons following in his wake and leaving Scott dangling from the tree. When they faded into the dark, Charlie felt her muscles unclench and she felt her shoulders slump as relief flooded through her. It took her a few moments to realize that her hand was still clutching Stiles's. From the way his twitched, she was pretty sure he realized the same thing, but neither of them moved. They waited a few moments to ensure that the hunters had really gone before moving out from behind the tree. As they did, Charlie ran her thumb over her fingertips as she walked towards Scott. Suddenly her hand felt oppressively empty.

"You okay?" Allison asked as they came to a stop in front of him.

Scott sighed and made a lame attempt at an upside down shrug. "Just another life-threatening conversation with you dad."

"Yeah, Allison," Charlie muttered. "No offense or anything, but your dad's kind of terrifying. I mean that was all cool and badass and stuff, but also a little bit psycho."

Allison ignored Charlie and let her eyes follow the line Scott was attached to. They stopped when they reached some sort of pulley mechanism attached to a nearby tree. "Stiles, help me with this."

Charlie hung back near Scott as the other two rushed over to the tree. She moved closer, narrowing her eyes at the loop encircling his ankle. She reached up and felt the wire. It was thin, but strong. Good thing Scott was a werewolf. Otherwise he would probably be looking at a wicked bruise in the morning. "I think Stiles has got some pliers in the toolbox in his car," she said, backing away a bit. "Those should cut through the wire."

Scott smirked up at her. He lifted his hand and stared at his fingers. The nails began to grow and taper off at the tip, forming sharp claws. He bent up at the waist, hauling his torso high enough that he could reach above his feet. He swiped his claws across the wire, severing it, and dropped to the ground with a soft thud. Charlie let out a sigh and rolled her eyes heavily. "Show off," she muttered bitterly.

His smirk widened even further and he turned to Stiles and Allison, who were still struggling with the pulley. "Thanks, but...I think I got it." He looked down at his right, clawed hand with a smugness that kind of made Charlie want to smack him over the head.

"Yeah," Stiles murmured, raising his eyebrows and looking between Scott and the piece of now useless wire hanging from the pulley.

"Like I said," Charlie sighed, smacking Scott in the arm. "Show off."

Without another word, Scott turned on his heel and began marching towards the house. He paused for a moment and glanced over his shoulder. "Uh, you guys? You coming?"

"Yeah, buddy," Stiles replied as the three of them fell in line. "We're coming."

The stairs leading to up to the house groaned as the four of them walked up the stairs. Charlie could feel the boards buckle slightly under her feet, like they were threatening to splinter and send her crashing to the forest floor. She made a note to tread lightly. A house could only go through so much before it gave in and came crashing down. Muddy boot prints covered the porch, no doubt tracked in by the dozens of police officers who had been there the day before. Scott stepped forwards, making sure that everyone else was securely behind him before he approached the door. It was already ajar, so only a gentle push was needed to send it swinging open, creaking on its hinges as it moved.

The inside of the house looked even more threatening than the outside. It was so dark inside that even the shadows seemed to have shadows. The faintest amount of moonlight trickled in, but where it did it illuminated the shattered windows, making them look like jagged teeth. Scott paused at the doorway and glanced back to the rest of them with a nervous smile. "Maybe we should knock first."

There was a round of humorless snorts. Scott took one more breath but then lifted his foot, moving it forward so it broke the plane of the threshold. Soon enough they all piled in, but stayed grouped close together as they scanned the rooms. As far as they could tell, everything was normal. Creepy as hell, but normal. The word 'normal' had taken on a bit of a new meaning these days.

Charlie's eyes trained in on one spot in particular. The floor of the living room. Amongst all the dust, dirt, and broken glass, there was something else, staining the floor black. And it was right where Kate had fallen. She was staring at what was left of the pool of Kate's blood. Charlie's eyes snapped over to Allison only to find the girl looking at the same spot. She reached out to put a hand on her shoulder—to comfort her in some way—but then stopped herself. It wouldn't be welcomed—not from her. That was Scott's job. She retracted her hand, hoping that nobody had noticed. But Stiles did. Of course Stiles did.

All of the sudden, Stiles cleared his throat, making all of their heads swing in his direction. "We, uh, we should probably split up. You know, cover more ground."

"Wha—are you serious?" Scott protested. "In the horror movies, it's always when they decide to split up that people start getting killed!"

"Well we're not going to be on our own," Stiles insisted. "Charlie and I will take the upstairs and you and Allison can take the downstairs and the basement."

After a few heavily charged glances, they parted ways with Charlie and Stiles picking their way up the disintegrating stairs. Charlie had never been in that part of the house before. The wood was charred and rotting, much like the downstairs, but for some reason it seemed...different. There were still traces that someone had actually lived there. Curtains, rugs, a broken mirror—the little things that change an empty building into an actual home. It made the whole place seem more...human. And that made it all the more heartbreaking.

When they got to the top of the stairs, Charlie reached back into her pocket and pulled out her cell, muttering the word 'lumos' before hitting the flashlight function and holding it up. "Alright," she whispered, the darkness around her forcing her to be quiet. "So let's start with the rooms on the left and then move on to the ones on the right." She began to move into the first set of rooms, but Stiles grabbed her shoulder, making her turn back around to face him. He had an uncertain expression on his face that made her frown in response. "What's up?"

Stiles opened and closed his mouth a few times, searching for the right words. "I was just—I mean, I was thinking—" He let out a sigh and pinched the bridge of his nose in frustration. When he removed his hand from his face, he was staring at her, his eyes full of concern. "Look, I'm sorry. With everything that's going on with Allison...I'm just really, really sorry. It's gotta suck."

Charlie let out a snort and shook her head dismissively. "I have one friend who's a werewolf and another who's part of a lineage of werewolf hunters. You've got nothing to apologize for, Stiles. It's not like anybody could have seen this coming. Like, ever." She did her best to look firm, but Stiles was still looking at her like she was wounded in some way. Which she found really annoying. "We've got work to do," she said pointedly. "Let's find Lydia."

Stiles opened his mouth to say something else, but she spun on her heel and walked into the nearest room. It looked like some kind of music room. Windows covered three of the walls, but all of them had been broken in and there were holes punched into the roof, allowing light to stream through in isolated beams. At the center there was a piano, which at one point might have been majestic, but was now crumbling just like the rest of the house. It screamed of wasted potential. "Alright," Stiles murmured as he followed her through the door. "That's a good talk. Lots of sharing of feelings. Very illuminating. Lots of opening up happening right here in this moment."

"Shut u—up," Charlie sang out, waving her phone about, checking every corner of the room.

"All I'm saying is that it wouldn't kill you to talk a little more," Stiles said from somewhere behind her. She could hear his footsteps as he moved around the room, investigating with her. "I mean Allison's angry, sure, but she's new to all this stuff. She doesn't get it yet."

Charlie's eyes fell on a closet door on the other side of the room. She marched in that direction while Stiles continued on with his monologue. "Maybe it might help if you just talked to her. If you told her everything you've been through, she might understand."

Charlie paused, her hand on the doorknob to the closet. "So let me get this straight," she sighed. "You're actually suggesting that I start talking _more_? As in more than I do now?"

"About the important stuff, yeah," Stiles replied. "I wasn't kidding about you having some communication issues. I mean, I still don't know your middle name."

"I still don't know your first name," Charlie pointed out, raising her eyebrows at him.

Stiles snapped his finger and pointed at her. "And you never will. I will forever be an international man of mystery." He circled around the piano, still glancing around suspiciously. "But that doesn't change the fact that you could be a bit more share-y. Or just apologize again."

Sighing heavily, Charlie wrenched the closet door open, jumping backwards lest anything come flying out at her, but it was empty. Letting out a small grunt of frustration and slammed the door shut. "Stiles, are you losing your hair?" she called out quietly. "You know, receding hairline, little bald patch on the top of the head."

He swung his head around to face her, wearing a perplexed expression. "What? No, of course not. Why?"

"No reason," she murmured. "I was worried for a second that you might be morphing into Dr. Phil."

Stiles let out a low chuckle that didn't sound entirely sincere. "You're doing it again."

"Doing what?" Charlie inquired.

"Deflecting anxiety with humor," he shot back. "It's okay to be freaked out, you know."

Charlie paused for a moment. "No, it isn't."

"Yes, it is," he insisted. "Seriously, why can't you just let yourself be freaked out?"

Charlie let out a frustrated sigh and ran her hands through her hair before turning to face him. "Because I have a job to do, Stiles. I need to find Lydia. I need to find her right now. And I can't let myself be freaked out until I do find her. So can we just—can we just do this now?"

The irony of the situation was that through that whole ramble, she probably seemed pretty freaked out. And she was. She really was. But somehow pretending not to be helped. If she didn't give in, she stayed functional—she stayed capable. Stiles nodded slowly in understanding. "Okay," he murmured, rubbing at the back of his head. "Okay, yeah, fine. She's not in here. Let's, uh—" he waved his hand around a bit"—let's go check the other rooms."

As they moved out the room, a swooping feeling of guilt washed through Charlie, piling on top of all those other sensations of guilt. Stiles had only been trying to help, and she had basically bitten his head off. Which was ironic given what they were currently doing. She glanced at him out of the corner of eye and scratched absently at her forehead. "It's Evelyn, by the way."

"What?" Stiles asked, frowning slightly.

"My middle name. It's Evelyn."

The tiniest ghost of a smile appeared on his face. "That's an old lady name."

"Shut up, Stilinski."

Bathroom, attic, bedroom—empty, empty, empty. They checked high and low, but Lydia was nowhere to be found. Eventually they found themselves in the last room. Another bedroom. It was just as still as the rest of the rooms, but for some reason it felt different. Charlie slowly moved around, checking the closet and under the bed. Again, empty. She was just about to suggest that they get going when something on the ground made her pause. She moved her iPhone flashlight to the area to inspect closer.

It was a picture frame, fallen so the picture side was on the floor. Silver, ornate without being gaudy, expensive—the kind of small luxury only a truly well-off family would have. Slowly, Charlie kneeled down and picked it up, flipping it over in the hand. The glass front had shattered completely. She shook it away and gingerly pulled out the photo. It was two boys who looked like they were in their mid- to late-teens, smiling at the camera. Both of them looked cocky, but the one on the left—the older one—looked especially smug. She turned the photo over, looking at the back. In the upper right hand corner was neatly written 'Peter and Derek, Summer 2004'.

Charlie stared down at the picture and stood back up. They just looked so...happy. He was smiling. Derek was actually smiling like a human person. And Peter, well he already looked like Peter. Maybe a little less damaged, but just as slick and cunning.

As she stared the photo, a ringing noise began to echo in her ears. It was like that reverberating sound that happens when metal hits metal, but instead of slowly fading away, it got louder and louder and more and more high-pitched. It felt like her eardrums were about to explode. Her heart began to pound in her chest and her breathing began quicker and more ragged. The fear was building up inside her veins. But then she looked up from the photo and it became paralyzing.

The room was on fire. The curtains and the bed were completely engulfed in flame and the wooden floorboards began to twist and contort in the heat. Smoke filled the room, making her eyes water and her lungs burn. She swung her head around, looking for some sort of exit, but all of the doors and windows were totally blocked by a wall of fire. She was trapped. Charlie began to hyperventilate, but that only meant she was sucking in more smoke, which could lead to one thing. She was about to pass out. Her vision began to get blurry and images seemed to be sliding sideways, even though she wasn't moving at all. Next she lost her balance, wobbling on her feet. She squeezed her eyes shut, trying to force her brain to stay awake—to stay functioning.

"Charlie, are you okay?"

The words seemed slow and slurred as they reached her ears—like she was listening to someone speak while her head was under water. Her eyes flew open again. No fire, no smoke—there was just Stiles staring at her. She looked around the room frantically through widened eyes, trying to find some trace of that fire, but there was none. At least not for the past six years. She felt hands gripping each of her shoulders to steady her. Now she couldn't hide the fact that she was trembling.

"Hey, hey, hey," Stiles whispered comfortingly. "Are you okay?

Charlie swallowed heavily and nodded. "Yeah. Yeah, of course. I'm always okay."

He removed his hands from her shoulders, but that worried look was still there. "What was that?"

She pursed her lips and shrugged her shoulders casually. "What was what?"

"You just—you just sort of stopped. And then you got this look on your face." He waved his hand in the general direction of his face. "It was like you saw a ghost."

"Nothing," she replied a little too quickly. "Just thinking." She swung her head around, taking in the room. "Lydia's obviously not here. We can't afford to waste any more time. She's still out there."

Stiles opened his mouth to say something else, but before he could Charlie brushed past him, moving down the stairs. A loud harrumph issued forth from somewhere behind her as Stiles followed her. She might have put a stop to the conversation for the present, but Stiles definitely wasn't going to let that little 'episode' go. Hell, he was probably already concocting theories. Which meant that she should probably start coming up with a semi-decent explanation. But for now, she had a good enough distraction. Lydia. Lydia would be enough to keep Stiles's mind occupied for a good long while.

By the time Stiles and Charlie were done, Scott and Allison were already waiting for them at the bottom of the stairs. "Any luck?" Allison asked, the tiniest bit of hope in her voice.

"Nope," Stiles replied, shaking his head. "She's not upstairs."

"She wasn't anywhere downstairs either," Scott muttered. He rubbed at the back of his neck and glanced around him one more time before sighing heavily. "She's not here. She might've been before, but she's not anymore."

Disappointment flooded through Charlie, making her feel cold. She wrapped her arms around her waist in some futile attempt to warm herself up. "Okay, so she's not here. Scott can go sniff around and pick up the trail. We can find where she went next." A guilty expression crossed Scott's face, making Charlie feel even colder. "Scott, what's that expression about?"

He let out a heavy sigh and glanced towards the front door. "I already did. Her scent—I can't track it anymore."

"What do you mean 'you can't track it'?" she bit out. "You smelled her all the way from the hospital to here. That's like five miles! How is the trail gone all of the sudden?! That just—it doesn't make any sense!"

"I know," Scott said, waving his hands around in frantic, jerky movements. "It—it doesn't make any sense, but it's just not there anymore. And the smell in the house—it's getting fainter, like the wind is blowing it away or something. I can still smell her, but there's no distinct trail. It's just...everywhere. I can't pinpoint it. She's not here, but I can't tell where she went. It's getting close to ten, and if Allison's parents realize she's gone—"

"Then you get to lose about seventy pounds really, really quickly," Charlie muttered bitterly. "Yeah, I got it."

"Look, maybe we just need to regroup," Stiles interjected, moving so he was standing shoulder to shoulder with Charlie. "We're all running on fumes here. I mean, Charlie, you've gotten like three hours of sleep over the past two days. Honestly I'm not sure how you're still awake right now, let alone functional."

"Cocaine," she answered glibly.

Stiles rolled his eyes at her before continuing. "Look, the point is we all need to be thinking straight. We're not going to help anybody if we can't focus. And plus what are we going to do? Just wander around in the woods and hope that we run into Lydia?"

"Sounds like a solid plan to me," Charlie grumbled, kicking at some of the glass littering the floor. Honestly, there probably wasn't anything she could do at that point. She knew that. But going home felt a little too much like giving up, and she wasn't going to give up on Lydia. Not ever.

"Look," Stiles said, waving his hands around a bit. "Right now we've got no leads. I can go home and check through my dad's stuff. If I find any new information, we can go from there."

"Stiles is right," Allison said. "We can't just stumble around in the dark. We could run straight into my dad. Or worse." She turned to Charlie, looking at her earnestly. "Tomorrow after school. We'll keep looking." Charlie blinked at the sudden demonstration of gentleness. Allison twitched slightly, realizing that she had unconsciously slipped back into their previous friendship. She shifted on her feet and broke eye contact, focusing on the floor instead.

After that, it seemed pretty much decided. Scott decided to stay behind and make sure that he didn't miss anything, while Charlie, Stiles, and Allison all made their way back to the Jeep. Allison quickly clambered into the back bench while Charlie took the spot next to Stiles. She still got the impression that Allison was trying to stay as physically far away from her as possible. Another quick kick to the gut before Stiles started the car.

As they drove off, Charlie felt like she was leaving a piece of herself behind in that house. What scared her, though, was she wasn't sure what the origin of that feeling was. She told herself that it was because Lydia had been there—that she felt that way because she was leaving behind her friend. But another part of her thought that maybe it was because of something else. Because of what Peter did to her. She shoved her hands deep into her jacket pockets, closing herself off, but her right hand came into contact with something. Paper. It was thick, glossy on one side, matte on the other. It was the photo—the one of Derek in Peter. During her trance or whatever the hell it was, she must have put it in her pocket. As if things hadn't gotten weird enough already.

The drive home was quiet, none of them speaking. They were way too wrapped up in their own thoughts to actually talk to each other. Allison insisted that they drop her off a few blocks away from her house. As soon as she was out of the car, she went all 'stealth-ninja', creeping around in the bushes and becoming basically invisible. For someone who had only known the truth about her family for about two weeks, she was taking to it really quickly. Charlie doubted that the Argents would even have the slightest idea that she was gone.

Finally, they arrived in front of Charlie's house. The driveway was still empty. Mel was still at the shop. It was probably a good thing—it meant less questions—but the idea of being alone right now...it wasn't something she was looking forward to. The Jeep idled in the driveway, the engine still running, but Charlie didn't make a move to unbuckle her seatbelt. She just sat there silently. Her eyes moved up to rearview mirror where she saw the Martin house across the street. The light was still on. Mrs. Martin was home, but Charlie got the feeling that she wouldn't be sleeping at all either.

"We're going to find her, Charlie," Stiles said. She could feel him looking at her, but she didn't take her gaze off the house. In the corner of her eye, she saw Stiles shift so that his arm was propped up on the seat behind and he was facing her. "Scott's not gonna give up until he finds her. Neither am I. Neither are you. We've got a combined stubbornness level that is so ridiculously high that we can't not find her. It's a statistical impossibility."

A tiny smile pulled at the corners of her mouth. "Thanks."

"No problem."

"No, Stiles," Charlie murmured. She finally turned to face him fully. "I mean thanks for everything. For keeping me sane these past couple of days. And for putting up with me when I get all...me-like. I know I'm not the easiest person to be around sometimes." She sighed and shot him an apologetic look. "I'm sorry I called you Dr. Phil."

Stiles let out a loud snort and shook his head. "I can see why you would," he shot back, a bit of humor in his voice. "I am remarkably emotionally understanding with a deep knowledge of the human condition."

Charlie rolled her eyes and shook her head. "You're an idiot is what you are."

"Hey!" Stiles exclaimed, placing a hand over his heart like she had wounded him. "That's very hurtful."

Charlie smiled at him for a moment before reaching to unbuckle her seatbelt. Stiles's face fell slightly, like he was disappointed. But she wasn't getting out of the car. Not yet. As soon as she was free of her seatbelt, she reached over and pulled him into a tight hug. It didn't even take half a second before he hugged back, wrapping his arms around her waist. Charlie buried her face into his shoulder and tightened her hold on him. He felt like an anchor, tethering her to the earth and keeping her from floating away on a cloud of her own panic.

For a long time, neither of them showed any sign of letting go. For some reason, their kiss popped into her mind. How it had made her feel—excited and nervous and safe and comfortable all at once. She found herself wondering if he was thinking about the same thing, but that wasn't likely. He was probably thinking about Lydia wandering around out there, cold and alone, like she should be. Slowly, Charlie released him and pulled back. "I should—I should probably get inside," she murmured, jerking her thumb in the direction of her house.

"Y—yeah," Stiles stammered, nodding along with her words. "Yeah, sure. Get some sleep."

"You too." Charlie clambered out of the car and slammed it behind her, but before heading up the steps to her house, she paused in the window. She wrapped her knuckles nervously against the window sill. "Look, if you find out anything, and I mean anything...I don't care what time it is, just—"

"Call you," Stiles finished for her. "Yeah, I will."

Charlie pressed her lips together into a thin line and nodded at him. "Thanks again, Stiles. For everything."

His eyebrows furrowed slightly as he looked at her. "Yeah. Always."

The front door to her house seemed daunting as she approached it. For some reason she felt like there was something waiting for her on the other side for her. Stiles didn't leave until she had her front door open. She paused at the doorframe and waved goodbye before he drove off. When his car disappeared around the corner, she stepped inside and closed the door behind her.

The house almost felt alien to her now. Over the course of the past few days, it felt like her life had shifted. The hospital seemed more like home than this place did now. It was like her life had been divided into two distinct parts—before Lydia was attacked, and after. Charlie—her being—belonged to the era after the attack. Everything in her house came from before.

Her feet dragged as she made her way up the stairs. They felt heavier somehow, like they had been encased in lead. For the past couple of hours, all she had been running of was adrenaline and Snickers, and even those two things could only do so much. Her stomach rumbled loudly, reminding her that it was completely empty, but she didn't have the energy to make herself anything to eat. All she could do was sleep.

Charlie walked straight to her room and switched on the light before shrugging out of her jacket. She tossed the jacket aside and moved towards that floor-length mirror that was installed on the door to her closet. Against the glass she had taped a picture of her and Lydia—one of those cheesy facebook photos where you pose cheek-to-cheek. Lydia was blowing kisses at the camera and Charlie was rolling her eyes—it kind of summed up their friendship if you thought about it. As she looked at it, a hollow feeling began building up in her chest. She wanted to cry—to sob with grief and let it all out—but she wasn't built that way. There was no release, only internalization of the pain. Eventually she dragged her eyes away from the picture to her reflection, to get a good look at the person she blamed for all this mess. Only it wasn't just her reflection.

"What the hell!"

She spun around to look behind her, only to find Derek Hale sitting in the shadows at the other end of the room, looking like some sort of mediocre supervillain. The panic that shot through her veins dissipated just as quickly and she slammed her fist to her forehead in frustration. "Hasn't anybody ever told you it's rude not to knock? And to break and enter?" She sucked in a deep breath and pinched the bridge of her nose before looking back up at him. "You've got a lot of nerve showing up here."

"Really?" Derek asked, slowly standing from his spot. "How do you figure that?"

"Well first of all I don't remember sending an invitation," Charlie growled.

"You show up at my house uninvited all the time," he pointed out. "Last time you shot at it. A lot."

Charlie ground her teeth, struggling to keep her composure. Between the sleep deprivation, resentment, grief, and general feeling of rage, she kind of felt like hitting someone. Something told her hitting Derek would not be a good idea. "Second of all," she bit out carefully, "you kind of epically screwed over a friend of mine. You remember Scott, right? Yay tall, big, soulful brown eyes, dark hair, trying to cure himself of being a werewolf? Someone you promised to help? I gotta say Derek, I though you were a lot of things—broody, tortured, incapable of expressing human emotion—but self-serving backstabber wasn't really on the list."

There was a small flicker in Derek's eyes—almost undetectable, but Charlie had caught it. At least he had the decency to be a little bit ashamed of himself. Charlie squared her shoulders and folded her arms across her chest, staring him down. "If you're looking for Scott, he's not here. I don't know where he is anymore."

"I'm not here about Scott," Derek growled.

"Then why are you here?" Charlie spat. Her mind jumped back to that dream—the teeth, the pain, the blood. "Are you here to finish what Peter started? Kill me or turn me, is that the deal?"

Derek's face darkened visibly and he took a small step towards her. "Do you think that's why I'm here?"

Charlie exhaled sharply and threw her hands in the air in frustration. "Honestly? I don't know. You went from being the bad guy to the good guy to the 'I'm-not-sure' guy to the bad guy again. You helped and then you stomped on any bit of hope Scott had. And for what? So your eyes could glow red and you could be a little bit more badass? I have no idea which version of you is showing up tonight, so why don't you stop wasting my time and tell me."

Derek's spine straightened, bringing him to his full height. Suddenly Charlie felt especially small and insignificant. "The bite is a gift," Derek said, his voice low and harsh. He took a few more steps towards Charlie. She stood her ground, but she felt her heart rate spike, a detail that would not go unnoticed by Derek. He came to a stop a few feet in front of her and stared down at her with that weird intensity of his. "Do you want it?"

"What the hell do you think?" she whispered back. "Do I want it?"

Derek exhaled sharply, something almost resembling a laugh. "You don't want it," he replied. "Or at least you don't think you do."

Charlie let out a groan and rolled her eyes dramatically. "Thank you, Mr. Cryptic, for those lovely insights into my own psyche."

As soon as she got those words out, it started happening again. Not like it had in the house—not that clear harrowing image of the room on fire—but like it had in the hospital. The flashes, the screams, the pain—it was all back again. Charlie grabbed the doorknob of the closet to steady herself and pressed the heel of her hand against her forehead. Her stomach twisted and contorted and she ground her teeth together to force back the scream. And then it was gone. Charlie gulped down some breaths and shook her head to rid herself of those images again.

"What was that?" Derek growled. "What just happened to you?"

"That's how I react when I find a conversation boring," Charlie replied. Her spine straightened and she turned towards him, staring him down with as much confidence as she could muster. "Now how's about we get to the point before I have a full-on seizure. Why are you here?"

Derek continued to eye her skeptically. Almost suspiciously, even. Like he was staring at a pile of clues and trying to figure out what they added up to. And his suspicion only served to make Charlie more nervous. Soon enough, though, he switched back into that familiar aggressive look of his. "Tell me about Lydia."

The hand that was encircling the closet doorknob instinctively tightened. The Argents were already speculating on Lydia and her humanity. If Derek was doing the same thing, that couldn't be a good sign. She cleared her throat and shrugged nonchalantly. "She's a stubborn, redheaded Aries who loves long walks on the beach and Chanel No. 5."

Derek cocked his head to the side and narrowed his eyes at her. "You know that's not what I meant. What's happening to her?"

"How the hell am I supposed to know that?" Charlie spat, pointing at herself. "You're the one with all the supernatural knowledge. Shouldn't you be telling me?"

"I wasn't in the hospital. I don't know the details. Is she turning?"

At that question, Charlie felt her confidence waver. Sighing heavily, she released the doorknob she was still clutching and crossed her room and perched herself on the edge of her bed. Did she trust Derek? No, not fully. Not even a lot. But when it came to the supernatural, he was the only one who had any answers for her. And if she didn't give him the information, he would just find it out somewhere else. "I don't know," she whispered, staring down at her own feet. "There's no supernatural healing. And the doctors...they said she was having an allergic reaction to the bite. But she didn't die." She looked up at him, her eyes questioning. "Has that ever happened before? Receiving the bite but not turning or dying? Is that possible?"

Derek began to pace back and forth, his shoulders rigid. "Not that I've ever heard before, but...it could be happen." He turned to her and let his eyes bore into hers. "Do you know anything else?"

Charlie gnawed anxiously at her fingernails. She could tell Derek the details of Lydia's disappearance, she could tell him that they had tracked her to his house, but she didn't. Her trust in him didn't extend that far. Charlie wanted Lydia found more than just about anything, but even that desire was contingent upon something—who found her. She disliked the idea of Derek finding her almost as much as the idea of the Argents finding her. Because what she told Stiles earlier was true—as much as she might understand Derek's motivations, she couldn't predict what he would do. And she didn't want anything to do with Lydia to be left to chance. "No," she said with a shake of the head. "That's it."

If Derek could tell that she was lying, he didn't give any indication of it. But maybe it was because he was distracted. Just then, Derek stopped his pacing and his head snapped in the direction of the window. It was a few more moments before Charlie heard the sound of a car approaching. Mel's car. "I need to go," Derek grumbled, making his way towards the window.

Charlie threw herself to her feet and whipped around, fixing him with her gaze. "If you hurt her, I will kill you. I don't know how, but I will. And it will be painful, and profoundly gross. That's a promise."

Derek paused at the window and looked back at Charlie. "I'm not going to hurt her." He yanked open the window and stared out at the street. "Anyways, she's not the only one you have to worry about."

Charlie blinked in surprise. She opened her mouth to ask him what he could possibly have meant by that, but he disappeared. She was left staring at an empty window, the wind causing the curtains to billow inward in an eerie way. The cool breeze hit her, making her shiver, and she strode forwards to pull the window shut. Almost at the same time, she heard the front door slam closed. Mel was home. Charlie couldn't face her right now. After the night she had had, she couldn't stare into the face of someone she cared about and tell yet another massive lie.

In a flurry of action, Charlie stripped off her clothes and changed into a baggy T-shirt and sweatpants, shut off all the lights, and climbed into bed. She pulled the covers up to her neck and burrowed in deep, like somehow those few layers of cloth would protect her from the outside world. She didn't need them—not her. But Lydia did. Wandering around in the cold, she needed them.

After a few moments, Charlie heard footsteps coming up the stairs followed by her door creaking open. A thin beam of light crept through the door, hitting her in the face, but she kept her eyes closed, breathing softly and pretending to be asleep. The mattress sank slightly as someone sat down next to her. A soft, small hand pushed the hair out of her face and then a pair of lips pressed against her forehead. The mattress stayed sunken at that one point for a few minutes before the pressure lifted. She heard light footsteps moving away from her, and then the door to her bedroom closed again, leaving her alone in the dark.

For a long time, Charlie's mind jumped around. There was no shortage of anxiety- and insomnia-inducing topics for her to agonize over. After a while, though, her mind began to slow down. The adrenaline had finally faded away and the mental and physical exhaustion were catching up with her. She felt like she was sinking, almost melting into the mattress and pillow below her, until finally sleep claimed her.

**Chapter 2 Soundtrack  
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**Scott gets snagged by the trap, Papa Argent shows up to make some threats, and the group goes into the Hale house. **

**-~-~-~-Time to Kill – Gold & Youth**

**Charlie and Stiles investigate the upstairs rooms and Charlie hallucinates that the house is on fire.**

**-~-~-~-Don't Go - Dillon**

**Charlie arrives back at her house, talks with Derek, reflects on the day, and goes to sleep.**

**-~-~-~-Intro and Keep It Healthy - Warpaint**

**References!**

**The whole 'shock blanket' thing is a reference to...you guessed it! Sherlock.**


	3. I'm Friends With a Monster Under My Bed

**Disclaimer: 'Teen Wolf' isn't mine. Shocking, right? But it's true. If there are any similarities in content or dialogue, it has probably originated with the show.**

**A huge thank you to DarlingPeterPan, narusakulove97, bagginsofthesihre666, easythrowaway, Gee Brittany, heroherondaletotheresuce, BrightEyes20, winchesterxgirl, kittycat166, MikaHimura, emmy72, Daenerys86, YellowSubmarine93, Montanasmith5897, beautifulgreek523, Shes-The-Proto-Type, FairyKiller, nessafly, TheMMMG, Guest 1, swanqueen4, taytayfanatical, Bookiee, katiesgotagun, Tania, Aobhinn, ChaleseWinchester789, Jaiime95, SimplyKelly, Female whovian, TWsos12345, Marrow365, aguaysed, AlexMelRose, Thelastbuzz, Allie, and imrid-amrad-ursul for reviewing! I seriously appreciate it. And a huge thank you to BrittWitt16 for her genius.**

Chapter 3 – I'm Friends with the Monster under My Bed

Her head was about to explode. Literally explode. Like 'brain matter all over the ceiling', B-grade horror movie special effects explode. Or at least that's what it felt like.

Her alarm clock was louder than usual. It had to be. It was screeching at her like one of those alarms that warns you that the nuclear core of a submarine was about to melt down and send dozens of people to a firey and watery end. Charlie burrowed deeper under her covers, pulling them up around her head in a feeble attempt to block out the noise and the world around her. Like as long as she was under those covers, none of that 'other stuff' had actually happened. But it didn't work. The sound of the alarm cut through those flimsy blankets like a hot knife through butter, leaving her head pounding in time with the beep.

Charlie held out as long as she could until the beeping got to her—a full minute and a half—before letting out a loud groan and throwing the covers away and slamming a hand down on the alarm clock to make it shut the hell up. Even when the beeping had stopped, though, she could still feel it faintly ringing in her ears like a distant echo. It took her a while to finally get to her feet, and once she did, it was like she was on autopilot.

Getting ready for school seemed so utterly mundane after the night she had just had. Hell, it almost felt callous doing those little things—brushing your teeth, showering, putting on makeup—when Lydia was still out there. But she did it anyway. As soon as she made it to the bathroom, Charlie went straight to the medicine cabinet and grabbed the Advil, popping them into her mouth like candy and gulping down water. Her head was aching. She turned to the shower, ready to wash off the dirt and grief of the previous night, but paused before climbing in. For a second all she could remember was that empty hospital bathroom with the shower left running. Sighing heavily, she stepped in, allowing the scalding water to wash over her.

Peter had been in her dream again last night. And again, his presence there didn't make any sense. She had been wandering around in the woods, but the trees were so close together they formed walls, guiding her movements. It was a maze—a labyrinth—and she remembered being certain that Lydia was at the center, waiting for Charlie to find her. But Charlie didn't find Lydia. No, she rounded a corner, and found herself staring at none other than Peter Hale. She supposed his presence in her dream could have had some logical consistency to it. He could represent some sort of obstacle for her to overcome in her quest to find her friend. But he didn't. Instead he just followed her around while she looked, giving an extraordinarily detailed account of the plot of the movie 'Die Hard'. He was completely incongruous—he didn't _fit_—but he was still there.

Charlie tried to wash away those thoughts like she washed the shampoo from her hair. When she stepped out of the shower, she wiped away the steam clinging to the mirror and stared at her own reflection for a few moments. "Suck it up, Oswin."

Little thought was put into her outfit—even less than usual. She reached into her closet pretty much blindly and grabbed a loose-fitting, crop top with floral design, a pair of green, higher-waisted jeans, her Converse, and a leather jacket. Reaching a hand behind her neck, her fingers brushed against the, large, twisted, knot-like scabs that still marred her skin. She needed to hide them somehow. Going back into her closet, she fished around until she found a simple black scarf and wrapped it around her neck. She dabbed on her makeup, paying special attention to the dark circles under her eyes, yanked a comb through her hair a few times, and braided it messily before snatching up her messenger bag and jogging down the stairs.

By the time Charlie made it down the stairs, the smell of coffee was already wafting from the kitchen. She inhaled deeply, savoring the rich scent, but when she rounded the corner what she saw made her choke on her own breath. Mel was already up, darting around the kitchen in her satiny blue robe, and for some inexplicable reason there were mixing bowls and a waffle iron on the counter. A waffle iron which was currently emitting a cloud of thick, black smoke. Mel grabbed the plug to the waffle iron and yanked it from the outlet before snatching up and cutting board and using it to fan blow the smoke away. "Crap, crap, crap, crap."

Charlie dropped her bag by the door and entered the kitchen taking small, hesitant steps. "Um, Mel?" she asked hesitantly. "What are you doing?"

Mel didn't turn around to look at her, instead grabbing all the various and sundry cooking instruments and chucking them into the sink. "What does it look like I'm doing?" she called out over her shoulder, sounding a little bit out of breath. "I'm making waffles. What else could I possibly be doing?"

Letting out an amused and slightly patronizing snort, Charlie moved to the kitchen island and slid into one of the stools. "Committing arson," she replied snarkily. "I thought we established the last time you almost burnt down the kitchen that you and cooking are never going to hold hands and skip off into the sunset together. It was never meant to be. You just need to let it go."

Mel grabbed a potholder and carefully approached the waffle iron before opening it up and discarding the contents in the trash. "I will not give up," she said carefully. "Because this is what people do."

"People try and light their kitchens on fire?"

"No," she shot back. "People bring food. Whenever you need to feel better, people bring food." She sighed heavily and stared at the contents of the sink. "I probably should just stick to the bakery, shouldn't I?"

"It's the thought that counts," Charlie murmured.

"It's also the chocolate that counts," Mel replied. She opened a cabinet and pulled out a small cardboard box. "Chocolate croissants. Always have a contingency plan, Charlie. Always." With that, Mel finally turned around to plop the box on the kitchen island and looked at Charlie for the first time and blinked. "What are you doing?"

Charlie frowned slightly at the sudden shift in demeanor. "Um, I'm getting breakfast?"

"No," Mel said, shaking her. "You're dressed for school."

Charlie wrinkled her nose, making a weird face at her aunt. "Well spotted, Mel. You might not be a cook, but you could be a detective. Your powers of perception are breathtaking."

"Why are you dressed?" Mel asked.

"Because last I checked this wasn't a nudist household. Is my clothedness surprising to you?"

Mel huffed loudly rolled her eyes. "You know that's not what I meant, Charlie. I just didn't think you'd...I just figured you would have a hard time getting ready. With everything that's happened." She sighed and folded her arms over her chest, looking at Charlie with sympathy. "The sheriff called me late last night. He told me what happened at the hospital. I'm so sorry. I know if I were you I'd probably be an emotional basketcase."

Charlie inhaled sharply, but shrugged with as much casualness as possible. "Oh, come on, Mel. If we all stopped our lives when our best friend has a mental break and decides to go on a naked field trip through the woods, none of us would ever get anything done."

Mel looked at Charlie, her face full of sympathy. "Charlie, sweetie, you know you don't have to put on a brave face like this. It doesn't have to be business as usual. You can—"

"You want me to cope," Charlie interrupted. She let the façade fall for a moment and looked at Mel poignantly. "This is how I cope, Mel. I go on. I keep acting the same and say stupid and probably inappropriate things. Because if I didn't go on acting like everything was okay, all I would be able to do is revel in how not okay it actually is. Does that make sense?"

Mel pressed her lips together in a thin line and nodded with reluctant understanding. She circled around the kitchen island and came up behind Charlie, wrapping her in a hug and resting her chin on Charlie's shoulder. "You know, you...you are so much like your father," she whispered. "I swear, sometimes you'll be sitting there and you'll have this look in your eyes, and I can swear I'm staring straight at him. He was always the strong one out of the two of us—he always protected me. When I was younger I used to think he was this—this superhero, that he could never get hurt. He was invincible. It took me a really, really long time—years, even—to see that he wasn't. He always put everything on him." Mel removed her arms from around Charlie and spun the stool around so they were facing each other. "You don't have to do that Charlie. I'm here to help you with anything. I know you probably won't ask, but I just needed to tell you that."

Swallowing heavily, Charlie nodded at her aunt. "I know that, Mel. I've always known that."

Mel sighed and lifted her hand up to Charlie's cheek, gently brushing her thumb against the skin. "But you haven't needed me yet."

Charlie had been staring straight into Mel's eyes through the whole speech, but now she looked away. Suddenly she felt more than a little bit ashamed of herself. She just couldn't stop letting people down. Lydia, Allison, and now Mel. She was pretty sure Stiles was the next one to cross off that list. Mel seemed to pick up on the train of thought, because she grabbed hold of Charlie's chin and forced the girl to look at her. "Hey, it's okay," Mel insisted. "You've barely been here six months. We'll get there."

A relieved breath issued forth from Charlie's mouth as she looked at Mel. If there existed on this earth a single perfect human being, it was probably Mel. Her lips quirked up in a small smile. "I love you."

Mel smirked widely and stood straight. "I know."

Charlie blinked at the turn of phrase and slowly got to her feet. "Mel..." She drawled out, folding her arms across her chest. "Did you just make a 'Star Wars' reference?"

"Before Harrison Ford climbs into the giant, industrial-sized freezer," the woman said with a shrug. "You kept rambling about it and I figured I should find out what you were so excited about."

"And?"

She blew out a long breath and stared absently out the window. "I just—I just don't understand the point of the Ewoks. They look like dirty, homeless Care-bears."

"You shut your mouth," Charlie growled.

Mel threw her hands up in the air, like Charlie had just pulled a gun on her and began backing away slowly. "Okay," she declared, fighting back a good-natured laugh. "So I might not like 'Star Wars' and I might not be able to cook you breakfast, but could I at least fix your hair? Seriously, it's kind of a disaster. A beautiful disaster, but still a disaster."

About ten minutes later, Charlie was leaving the house with a croissant and a neatly arranged French braid. As she approached her car, she checked her phone. No messages from Scott or Stiles. No new information. Charlie's hand tightened around the phone, squeezing so tight she was surprised it didn't fracture into pieces.

Sliding into her car, Charlie sat behind the steering wheel for a few moments. School wasn't for almost another hour, but she had no idea what to do with herself. She couldn't just sit around, twiddling her thumbs and having a lazy morning. For a moment she considered breaking into the coach's office and moving all the items on his desk three inches to the left, but she couldn't do that either. There was one thing that she needed to do—that she was supposed to do—and that was to find Lydia. Unfortunately she had no idea where to start.

A glimmering flash of light caught her eye and Charlie glanced in its direction, finding herself staring at her dad's old St. Christopher's medallion. A humorless snort forced its way out of her nose. She wasn't quite sure what the use the patron saint of travelers was if she didn't know what her destination was. Still, though, she reached forward and took hold of it, removing the chain from where it was slung around the rearview mirror. She brought the cold metal up to her face and pressed her lips against it before bringing the chain over her head and tucking the ornament under the neckline of her shirt. She could use all the luck she could get on a day like this one.

"Suck it up, Oswin."

Shoving her keys into the ignition, Charlie revved the engine of her car loudly before taking off down the street. She rolled down the windows and blasted the music loud. It left her mind numb, and numb was definitely better than the alternative. The wind whipped through her hair, sending the stray hairs flying about. Her face stung slightly as they hit skin, but it was oddly satisfying. It felt liberating, breathing in the fresh air.

Charlie flew down the street at a speed that probably violated one or more traffic regulations, until she saw something in the distance. Blue and red lights cut through the remains of the morning mist. Charlie's foot hit the brakes and she slowed the car down, her breath catching in her throat. Hope and fear filled her simultaneously, mixing together to form an emotion she couldn't quite describe. They found something. They had to have found something. She pulled to the side of the road and threw the car into park and grabbed her bag before practically exploding through the door.

At first Charlie didn't realize where she was. She was so preoccupied trying to get to those beige uniforms, it wasn't until she practically tripped over a gravestone that she acknowledged she was in the cemetery. Pausing at the line of crime scene tape, she let her eyes rake over the scene. It looked like something out of the Twilight Zone. There was a gaping hole in the ground, probably for a fresh grave. Kate's grave. Charlie inhaled sharply at the sight of it, but forced her mind not to dwell. There was way, way too much else going on. Especially with what was next to it. Another open grave, only that one wasn't neatly excavated. The dirt had been ripped away, like somebody was trying to burrow into the grave.

Shaking her head, she cast off that strange trance she had been dragged into and continued to look around. Finally her eyes fell on a khaki uniform connected to the back of a head that she found quite familiar. She grabbed the caution tape and yanked it up before ducking under it and making a beeline for that particular person. As she marched with determination, another figure appeared in her plane of vision. Deputy Sean happened to glance in her direction and did the most dramatic double take she had ever seen. He immediately locked in on her position and began to shake his head at her. "No. No way. No, no, no, no, no."

Luckily enough for Charlie, he was standing a couple of yards off. She just flashed him a wide smile and continued on her way. "Hey, Sean!" she called out with a wave. "So nice to see you. Good times."

"You can't be here," he shouted. He pointed dramatically at the crime scene tape. "Get back behind there right now."

Charlie ignored him and kept walking to the center of the cemetery where three people were standing around an open grave. "Sheriff Stilinski?"

At the sound of her voice, the sheriff's shoulders tensed slightly. Letting out an audible sigh, he turned around slowly with a wince etched into his features and surveyed her with a look that seemed to be equal parts sympathy and frustration. She jogged over to them and by chance happened to glance into the gaping pit in the ground. Something had crudely ripped into the dirt and through the wood of the coffin, revealing the resting corpse. Charlie's eyebrows shot up into her hairline as she stared down at the thing. "What the hell?"

"Charlie?"

Another younger voice reached her ears, causing her gaze to slide past the sheriff to the people standing behind him. One of them . "Isaac?" she demanded, frowning in confusion. She barely knew him, but it felt so strangely out of context to run into him like this, especially given his appearance. His clothes were rumpled and dirty, his hair was unkempt, and he had dark circles under his eyes. Or at least under the right eye. Any traces of exhaustion that might have been on the left had been covered up by a fresh, mottled purple bruise. Charlie's forehead creased as she took in his appearance. Under her scrutiny, Isaac's shoulders slumped, giving him a closed off look. He stared at his shoes and kicked absently at the grass. The silence built up to a special level of awkwardness. Unfortunately, the statement that broke that silence only served to make things more awkward.

"Well look at that," the man standing next to Isaac said smugly, clapping a hand on Isaac's shoulder. "We found a girl your age who actually talks to you." Then he turned to Charlie and smiled a creepy smile that made her feel slimy. Charlie folded her arms across her chest and curled her lip slightly.

"Who are you and why?" she muttered, looking him up and down through narrowed eyes.

"He's my dad," Isaac answered, nervously glancing at the man. "What, uh, what are you doing here?"

"I'm pretty sure I'm the one that's supposed to ask that question," the sheriff interrupted. He grabbed Charlie by the arm and pulled her a few feet away, out of earshot of the other two. He sighed heavily and pinched the bridge of his nose in frustration. "You're supposed to be in school."

"Not for like twenty minutes," she said with a shrug. "I've got some time."

"You know that crime scene tape?" the sheriff continued raising his eyebrows and gesturing over her shoulder. "The stuff that's bright yellow, says 'Do Not Cross', and is way, way over there? You're not supposed to cross it."

"Really?" Charlie chirped. "I thought it was more of a suggestion. You know, a helpful hint."

"It doesn't say 'we kindly suggest that you do not cross the line'," he replied shortly. "It says 'Do NOT Cross'. As in 'don't'."

"Well I'll file that away for future reference," she said with a shrug.

Sheriff Stilinski sighed and scratched absently at his forehead. "And when you open up that file, you're just going to ignore it, aren't you?"

"Obviously."

The sheriff glanced over his shoulder at Isaac and his dad who were still standing there silently. Mr. Lahey appeared to be getting angrier and angrier, checking his watch and glaring at pretty much everything in sight. It took her about two seconds to decide that she did not like him. At all. The man noticed her looking at him and smiled broadly. Charlie made a face and shivered in response. Creepy. She leaned slightly towards the sheriff, her voice coming out as a whisper. "Can we arrest him for something, please?"

The sheriff let out a cough that sounded suspiciously like a snort and turned back to face her. "Okay, first of all," he murmured, holding up a finger, "'we' don't arrest people. I arrest people. And second of all, what exactly do I arrest him for?"

Charlie pursed her lips in thought and bounced up and down on the balls of her feet. "I don't know. Leering. Jaywalking. Driving while creepy. Make something up."

"What are you doing out here, Charlie?" Sheriff Stilinski said with a frustrated sigh.

"Bird watching," Charlie quipped. "I though I saw a Scarlet Tanager and just couldn't help myself."

"That's a ridiculous answer."

"A ridiculous answer for a ridiculous question." Sheriff Stilinski blinked at the bluntness, but then his gaze softened. Charlie blew out a long breath and chewed on her lip, shifting into a more serious tone. "I saw the police lights and had to stop. Have you found anything? And I mean anything. And what the hell is going on with that body?" The sheriff glanced hesitantly back at Isaac and his father. "You know I'm going to find out anyway," Charlie pressed. "Anything I might find out now I would absolutely find out in twenty minutes."

"Really?" The sheriff folded his arms across his chest and shifted on his feet so that he was staring her down. "How do you figure that?"

"Because I sit next to Stiles in first period," she replied easily. "The only thing you sending me away would do is leave me with a few more minutes anxiety."

The sheriff opened his mouth and closed it again, looking for some other argument to throw in her general direction, but as soon as she played the 'Stiles card' they both knew her knowing every intimate detail of the case was pretty much inevitable. He still looked like he was on the fence, but then Mr. Lahey prodded him into a decision.

"Excuse me? Are we supposed to be standing here all day?"

Hearing the grating voice behind him, the sheriff looked up at the sky like he was saying a silent prayer before shifting his gaze back to Charlie. He simply inclined his head in the direction of Isaac and his dad, indicating for her to follow him back over there. Charlie pumped a fist in the air in victory making the sheriff roll his eyes at her. "You're lucky I like you," he growled as they walked towards the Laheys.

"I look in the mirror and tell myself that every day," she quipped back, eliciting yet another eye roll.

"You let me do the talking," the sheriff insisted. "I don't want to hear a single word out of your mouth from this moment forward."

"Aye-aye, captain," Charlie shot back with a salute.

"What did I just say?" the sheriff said, groaning in frustration. Charlie pressed her lips together in a thin line and mimed locking them shut. "Good."

Apparently Mr. Lahey didn't like waiting. Any degree of goodwill or cheerfulness he might have held earlier in the conversation had vanished entirely and he was left there, scowling. "Can we move this along?" he demanded, no small measure of hostility in his voice. "I have work to do."

"Of course," Sheriff Stilinski said, ignoring the hostility being directed at him. He reached into his pocket and pulled out a pen and that weirdly official looking pad of paper that cops always carry before fixing Isaac with a serious stare. "Okay. Let's take this from the beginning. Name?"

Isaac glanced over at Charlie, probably wondering what the hell she was still doing there. He shoved his hands into the pockets of his jackets. "It's, uh, Lahey," he muttered nervously. "Isaac Lahey."

"You work for your father, Isaac?"

"When he's not in school," Mr. Lahey interjected. "Which is where he needs to be in twenty minutes." He jerked his chin in Charlie's direction. "Her too."

"I understand that," Sheriff Stilinski assured him. "But we've got a missing teenage girl and our K9 unit led us here."

Charlie was surprised her neck didn't break given the force which it snapped around. How could Lydia have made it all the way out here? They were miles away from the hospital and from Derek's house. How could she possibly have made it to all of those places in one night? And why? It made a tiny bit of sense that she would go to Derek's, but the local cemetery? Charlie studied the sheriff's face, looking for any hints that his expression might betray. "Hold on," she interjected, holding a hand out to pause the conversation. "She was here? Lydia was here? You're sure?"

The sheriff shifted on his feet and shot her a reproving look. "Remember that little agreement we had where you didn't talk."

"We didn't pinky swear so it doesn't count."

Ignoring her, the sheriff turned back to the questioning. "Look, this girl—she's not wearing any clothes and if she's out here tonight and the temperature really drops—"

"I—I'm sorry," Isaac stammered out, shaking his head. He seemed unsure, even shifty. Like he knew more than he was saying, but wasn't sure how to say it. "I, uh, I didn't see anything."

At that point Mr. Lahey let out a derisive bark of laughter. "Trust me. If he saw a naked girl outside a computer screen, he'd remember."

Isaac's eyes widened in embarrassment, making eye contact with Charlie for about half a second before he flushed red and stared intently at his feet. Mr. Lahey continued to laugh jovially at his son's expense. She stared at him in disbelief, her lip curled slightly. Nope. She didn't like him at all. And given that mark on Isaac's face, she had a sickening feeling that the abuse wasn't limited to the verbal variety. Apparently Sheriff Stilinski was thinking along the same lines. He glanced back and forth between father and son, a suspicious expression on his face.

"How did you get that black eye, Isaac?"

Suddenly the air around the four of them seemed to become very thick. The level of tension around them all skyrocketed. Mr. Lahey turned to look at Isaac through harsh, narrowed eyes. It was a charged look, almost like the man was giving him instructions. Something neither she nor the sheriff missed. "School," Isaac replied tersely.

"School fight?" the sheriff pressed.

Isaac pressed his lips together in a thin line and gave a single shake of the read. "No. Lacrosse."

"Lacrosse? You play for Beacon Hills?"

"Yeah," Isaac nodded.

"My son plays for the team. Well I mean, he's—he's on the team. He doesn't technically play, but...Not yet anyways, but—"

As the sheriff spoke, Isaac seemed to tune him out. His gaze slipped away from the man standing in front of him to just over his shoulder at the woods lining the cemetery. Frowning to herself, Charlie glanced over her shoulder to see what he was looking at, but nothing was there. Except for a suspicious rustling of leaves. "Something wrong, Isaac?" Sheriff Stilinski asked, reclaiming the boy's attention.

"Uh, um, no," Isaac stammered. "Sorry. J—just remembering I have a morning practice to get to."

The sheriff nodded in understanding and flipped his notebook closed before stowing it in his pocket. "Just one more question." He gestured down at the open grave. "You guys get many grave robberies here?

"A few," Isaac said with a shrug. "Usually they just take stuff like jewelry."

"What did this one take?"

Isaac glanced at Charlie, the tiniest bit of a wince appearing on his face. "Her liver," he answered bluntly.

"Her liver," Charlie repeated, seeking out confirmation. She wasn't sure she believed what her ears were telling her she had just heard. "The grave robber took her liver. As in the organ."

"Yeah," Isaac muttered, nodding a bit.

Charlie's face scrunched up into an expression of extreme distaste. "I don't even want to begin to think about what they're going to do with that."

Isaac let out a weak snort and a tiny half-smile formed on his face. He looked like he was about to say something in response, but before he got a chance his dad clapped a hand on his shoulder, making him twitch reflexively. The man looked around at all of them with a dour expression. "As much as I would love for this to turn into an ice cream social, my son needs to get to school. With all the questioning he's missed the bus which means that I have to drive him. So unless there's anything else you need from him, we'll be on our way."

Charlie bit her lip in thought. More had happened in the graveyard last night than Isaac had admitted to, that much was for sure. There was too much weird going on. And all indicators pointed straight to Lydia. But she couldn't just accept that. Not yet. She just didn't have enough information. For all she knew, Lydia _did_ do this. And the person with the best idea of what actually had happened was standing right in front of her. Isaac was acting really jumpy. Hell, he probably saw exactly what happened and convinced himself he was going crazy. But regardless of what he thought, he had information that she needed.

"I could give you a ride to school," she threw in, waving her hand a bit. Isaac twitched in surprise at the suggestion, so she offered up a tiny smile to reassure him. It didn't work.

Isaac's mouth opened and closed a few times, looking between her and his dad. "Y—you really don't have to do that if you don't want t—"

That smug, creepy smile returned to Mr. Lahey's face as he put a hand on his son's arm. "Isaac, please. You finally get the opportunity to be alone with a pretty girl and you're passing it up so you can make me have to drive you all the way to school. People are going to start talking."

The smile on Charlie's face tightened until it resembled a grimace more than anything else. She fought hard against the urge to say the word 'ew' and turned back to Isaac. "It's no problem. I mean we're both going to the same place." Isaac still looked vaguely unsure, but nodded in agreement. "Great," Charlie continued, jerking her thumb over her shoulder in the direction of the Impala. "I'm parked just over there."

After waving goodbye to Sheriff Stilinski and getting yet one more creepy look from Mr. Lahey, she and Isaac picked their way across the cemetery, dodging between the gravestones. Isaac was walking with his shoulders hunched in, like he was trying to make himself look as inconspicuous as possible. She wouldn't have even been sure that he was following her if it wasn't for the slight scuffing noise of his feet against the ground. As they approached the Impala, she fished the keys out of her messenger bag. "This is me," she called out over her shoulder.

"Whoa."

Charlie glanced up from her position next to the driver's side door to find Isaac staring at the car with wide eyes. "What is it?" she demanded, furrowing her eyebrows in confusion.

"This is your car?" he asked, waving his hand in the general direction of the Impala. "Like this is actually your car?"

"No," she chirped. "I just look around, decide which car is the nicest, and then steal it." Isaac blinked at her stupidly, making her snort loudly. "Yes, Isaac. This is my car."

He let out a light laugh and swallowed heavily before nodding his head awkwardly. "It's, uh, it's really, really cool."

A tiny smiled pulled at the corner of Charlie's lips. "Thanks." She opened the door and was about to slide in the seat when she realized that Isaac was still standing by the car, staring at the door handle with a small degree of reluctance. "You ready to go?" she prompted.

Isaac shook his head, like he was breaking himself out of a trance, and nodded enthusiastically. "Um, yeah. Yeah, sure. Let's go."

The two of them clambered into the car and Charlie took off down the street. Under normal circumstances she would probably be going a good ten to fifteen miles over the speed limit, but for once in her life she chose to drive sensibly. Not out of any concern for safety, but because she wanted to make the car ride as long as possible. The longer Isaac sat in the seat next to her, the more time she would have to get information out of him.

For the first couple of minutes, the car was almost unsettlingly quiet. Charlie refused to be the one to start the conversation. She had learned a long time ago that if you get the other person to start talking to you rather than the other way around, they were a lot more likely to volunteer information. If they began the conversation, they thought they had control of it. She knew the theory worked—she had tried it out plenty of times on plenty of people—but there was one little snag. Isaac wasn't much of a talker. She was on the verge of breaking down and saying something herself when the guy finally opened his mouth.

"Thank you," he said suddenly, making her glance over at him. "For the ride. Thanks."

"No problem at all," she said, shooting him a quick smile.

Isaac blew out a long breath and began fidgeting in his seat. He started drumming his finger nervously and shooting sideways glances in her direction. He was getting uncomfortable with the silence. Her strategy was operating as intended. "So, um, how was the rest of the dance? Did you have fun?"

Charlie's hands gripped the steering wheel a little tighter, but otherwise kept her emotions in check. "It was definitely eventful," she murmured quietly. "I'm not sure 'fun' is a great way to describe it, though."

As soon as the words left her mouth, all of the color drained out of Isaac's face. "Oh, crap!" he stammered out. "I—I'm sorry. I didn't even think about—"

"It's fine," Charlie said, cutting him off. "Really, it is. It's not like having your friend get mauled by a wild animal and then disappear into the woods is a typical way of ending the evening." She bit her lip and shook her head slightly, reassembling her thoughts. "So you're sure you didn't see anything?" she pressed. "I mean I'm not trying to be pushy. It's just..." Her voice trailed off and Charlie let out a loud sigh. "Look, anything could help. And I mean anything. If Lydia was there then maybe we could, I don't know—track her. Even the tiniest detail."

Isaac shifted in his seat and stared out the window, mostly to avoid looking at her. It was textbook evasiveness. He had definitely seen something, but there was no way he was about to share. "I'm really sorry," he mumbled. "I—I thought I heard something running around, but then I got knocked into that grave. I couldn't see anything from down there. Next thing I know, there's a giant hole in the ground where a grave's supposed to be. I've got no idea what did it."

'What'. He had used the word 'what', not 'who'. Charlie forced herself not to react. Isaac hadn't noticed the slip, so she sure as hell wasn't going to alert him to it. It might not be much, but it was a little bit more information. Charlie just hoped that the 'what' Isaac was referring to was not Lydia. Shaking off the surprise of the new revelation, Charlie eased her way back into casual conversation. Or at least what passed for casual conversation in Beacon Hills. "So did somebody actually steal that woman's liver?"

"Yeah," Isaac said with a nod. "That's all they took. Yanked it right out of her. Not something you want to look at."

Charlie let out a long, low whistle and shook her head in disbelief. "Who wakes up one day and says to themselves, 'You know what I could use today? A liver.'" She looked up at his reflection in the rearview mirror and eyed him curiously. "Except maybe cannibals."

Isaac made a face and shrugged. "Or zombies."

Charlie narrowed her eyes and smirked slightly. "Dr. Frankenstein-like psychopaths."

Taking her lead, Isaac carried on with the list as well. "Cult members."

"Rogue medical students."

"Fraternity pledges."

"Mr. Harris."

This list went on and on, for longer than was probably necessary or advisable. They wasted at least five minutes until Isaac landed on 'black market organ harvesters'.

"They must be pretty shitty organ harvesters," Charlie said through a snort. "I've heard that being dead for a week renders organs nonfunctional. Just as a general rule."

"Well they're operating on the black market," Isaac replied easily. "It's not like they have unions or codes of professional ethics."

Charlie let out a loud snort and rolled her eyes jovially. "The invisible hand of the free market will get rid of them," Charlie shot back. "If people keep dying, I think they might lose credibility. Plus I hear the severance packages in that industry are really crappy."

Isaac chuckled a bit before looking back out the window. He seemed like a pretty sweet guy. Even a little bit funny. At the very least he was willing to dive head first into her ridiculous antics. But he was still so impossibly closed off. Though she supposed that she could understand it. She wasn't exactly an open book herself. Plus they had only actually known each other for all of three days, and of those days they had interacted for just about a half hour. Charlie talked so much and so fast she was used to falling into conversation with people, but from what she could tell of Isaac, he was more closed off—more reluctant to interact with new, unfamiliar people. From the way his shoulders were stooped and his hands were still shoved in his pockets, she got the idea that he didn't want people to look too close. And she had a pretty good idea why.

Glancing out of the corner of her eye, Charlie noticed Isaac staring into the side mirror of the car. He was touching the skin around his bruised eye gingerly, like he was testing it out to see how much pain he would have to put up with. Charlie pressed her lips together in a small 'o' and blew out a long, steadying breath. Lacrosse. He said he had gotten that bruise playing lacrosse. But there was a small hitch with that explanation. The hitch being that it was completely impossible.

Charlie had been to a fair number of lacrosse practices over the past few months. Every time the players set foot on the field, they had their helmets and facemasks on. Every single time. You could say a lot of things about Coach Finstock, but he did care about the safety of his students and his players. One time Greenburg had forgotten to wear his on the field and the coach had ripped into him for a solid fifteen minutes. And that meant Isaac was lying. A big part of Charlie wanted to press him about the topic—to get him to open up so she could do something about it—but that wasn't going to happen. A complete stranger prying into something like that? He would retreat into his shell immediately and without hesitation. But that didn't mean she wasn't going to have a little chat with the sheriff after school.

The rest of the car ride was spent engaging in idle chitchat. Actually Charlie did most of the chatting and received a bunch of responses that ranged from single syllables, to actual full sentences. When she pulled into the parking lot, Isaac looked like he was simultaneously disappointed and relieved. The two of them slid out of the car and Isaac turned to Charlie. "Uh, thanks," he mumbled, scratching awkwardly at the back of his neck. "For the ride, I mean. Thanks."

"Yeah, sure," Charlie replied, nodding in his direction. "Any time."

A tiny, hesitant smile formed on his face. "So, uh, I guess I'll see you around then?"

"We share classes, Isaac," Charlie said with a smirk. "We'll be seeing each other pretty much every day."

"Yeah," Isaac replied, giving a slightly uncomfortable laugh. "And hey, I'm sorry about Lydia. I, uh, I know you guys are really close, so—"

Charlie wasn't sure how the sentence ended, because her attention was pulled elsewhere. Out of the corner of her eye she saw the backs of two very familiar heads on their way into the front of the school. Scott and Stiles, the two people that she absolutely needed to talk to. She turned back around to find that Isaac was still talking. "Sorry!" she murmured, an apologetic wince covering her face. "I'm really sorry, but I've got to go. There's something I need to do before class starts."

"Y—yeah," Isaac stammered out, nodding along with his words. "Yeah, of course."

Charlie shot him a half-smile and smacked his arm good-naturedly. "See you in chem, okay? Talk later?"

He swallowed heavily and nodded. "Sure. See you later."

Charlie nodded at him and turned away, taking a few steps towards the school, but then paused. "Hey, Isaac?"

He glanced back up at her, a question evident in his eyes. "Yeah?"

"If you ever need to, you know, talk...you know where to find me."

"Okay," he murmured, giving her a funny look. "Thanks?"

She gave a salute, grabbed her messenger bag out of the car and sprinted across the parking lot. As she moved she noticed some people giving her weird looks, though that might have been because she almost ran over several people and came close to colliding with several parked cars in her effort to catch up with Stiles and Scott. She finally reached them just as they beginning to climb the stairs up to the school. Their backs were turned to Charlie, so they didn't see her approach.

"Wait, her liver was missing?" Scott demanded in a tone of disbelief and disgust. "Lydia stole somebody's liver?"

"Yup," Stiles replied. "That's what they said on the police scanner. Grave robbery, missing liver."

Charlie took several large steps forward so that she fell in line with the two of them. "Hey," she said breathlessly.

At her sudden appearance, Stiles twitched violently, practically jumping in the air. "Jesus!"

"Calm down, jumpy," Charlie quipped back.

Stiles rolled his eyes and let out a loud groan. "You've got to stop doing that!" He narrowed his eyes at her, looking both concerned and guilty. "How long have you been standing there? How much did you hear?"

"You can untwist your panties," Charlie sighed. "I already know about the graveyard and the missing liver."

"Wha—how do you know that already?" Stiles demanded incredulously. "I literally just found out about it a minute and a half ago!"

Grabbing Charlie's arm, Stiles gently pulled her off to the side out of the way of the foot traffic with Scott following after them. The three of them came to a stop a little ways in front of the entrance to the school building and huddled up like they were at the beginning of a football game. Or lacrosse game. They stood slightly off to the side. The students flowed around them as they made their way into the building, and again Charlie found herself on the receiving end of some pretty suspicious looks. She should probably have expected as much. One of her best friends was on a naked walkabout through the woods and the other apparently had a psycho serial killer for an aunt. A certain degree of notoriety was to be expected. Not that she gave a shit.

"Okay," Stiles said as soon as they were out of the way. "So how in the hell did you find out about the liver?"

"I drive by that graveyard every day on the way to school," Charlie murmured so only Stiles and Scott could hear. "What the hell am I supposed to do? _Not_ break into the crime scene? Get your head out of your ass, Stilinski."

Stiles shot her a look that looked to be equal parts proud and frustrated, and Scott just look confused. "So you saw the body," Scott pressed. "The liver was actually missing?"

"Yup," Charlie confirmed, popping the 'p'. "It looked like a game of 'Operation' went horribly, horribly wrong."

"So Lydia ate the liver," Scott muttered, his lip curling slightly in disgust.

"No, I didn't say she ate it—I just said it was missing," Stiles protested. "And even if she did, so what? It's the most nutritious part of the body!"

"Just because it's practical cannibalism doesn't mean it's any less gross," Charlie muttered bitterly.

"I never ate anybody's liver," Scott muttered.

"Well that's fantastic, Scott," Charlie chirped with mock enthusiasm, smacking him hard on the back. "Gold star for you."

"Yeah, right," Stiles muttered sarcastically. "Because when it comes to werewolves you're a real model of self control." Then Stiles's face morphed into a pensive expression, like he was considering his own words. "Actually, wait. Hold on." He smacked Scott in the arm and pointed at him. "You're the test case for this so we should be going over what happened to you."

"What do you mean?" Scott asked, looking at Stiles in confusion.

"I mean what was going through your mind when you were turning," Stiles barreled on, waving his hand in a circle like he was physically trying to spur on the conversation. "What you were drawn to."

A wistful expression crossed Scott's face and Charlie let out a loud groan. "Please, please don't say it."

Scott gave a slightly apologetic shrug. "Allison."

Stiles rolled his eyes while Charlie scrunched up her face and shook her head at him. "Ugh. Boring."

"Okay, nothing else—seriously?" Stiles demanded, his frustration mounting.

"Nothing else mattered," Scott murmured, that slightly concussed look returning to his face. But then for the first time in the history of the saga that was Scott and Allison, he managed to snap out of it without someone hitting him over the head. He looked up at Stiles with a weird sort of hope in his eyes. "That's good, though, right? Because the night Lydia was bit, she was with you."

Stiles's eyes widened slightly and his jaw twitched. He shot a sidelong, saddened, and oddly nervous glance at Charlie before turning back to Scott. "Yeah," Stiles replied in a low, frustrated-sounding tone, "but she was looking for Jackson. If she starts feeling a weird pull or whatever, it'll probably be towards him."

Great. That was just freaking great. Charlie's hand clutched the strap of her messenger bag just a little bit tighter. She kept her eyes fixed on the ground and bit down on the inside of her cheek to make sure she didn't betray that swooping sensation of disappointment. Time to soak it all in. This was the type of feeling she would probably have to get used to. There was no way in hell she was going to start avoiding Stiles because of something so irritating as 'feelings'—he meant way too much to her for that—so she needed to learn how to deal with it, and fast. She could internalize all the angst. She had certainly had enough experience with it. But apparently she was out of practice.

"Hey, are you okay?" Scott asked gently, putting a hand on her shoulder.

Swallowing heavily, Charlie glanced up at Stiles and Scott and nodded. "Yeah. Yeah, I'm fine. It's just...what if it wasn't Lydia that stole the liver?"

"What do you mean?" Scott asked. "The police tracked her to the graveyard."

"Just because the dogs led the cops to that graveyard doesn't mean it was her," Charlie reasoned. "She could have been gone before that even happened. Or gotten there after it happened. I mean she showed up at Derek's, right? Peter's body was there, wasn't it? And she didn't steal his liver. If she's got some irresistible craving for livers, why wouldn't she take his? Plus she's not exhibiting any of the characteristics typical of turning. Even Derek's stumped."

"Whoa, whoa, whoa!" Stiles practically shouted. He took a step towards her and fixed her under a serious glare. "What do you mean Derek's stumped? How could you possibly know what Derek's—" He didn't finish the sentence, instead shaking his head and waving his hands around more than usual. "You know what? No. Just no. I don't wanna know." He folded his arms across his chest and bit his lip, staring off into the distance and trying really, really hard to look both aloof and pissed. Charlie and Scott exchanged a glance, both of them silently counting down till he exploded again. Which would happen in three...two...one...

"Alright, just tell me!" Stiles spluttered. "Where the hell did you find the guy?"

"I didn't find him," Charlie said with a shrug. "I got home and he was in my room."

Stiles let out a bitter snort and rolled his eyes. "Great. Because that's not creepy at all."

"He was looking for Lydia," Charlie continued. "He wanted to know if she was turning."

"You didn't tell him anything, did you?" Scott hissed.

"Come on, Scott," Charlie groaned. "What do I look like? I gave him the information he'd be able to find out anyway to get him to open up a bit on the subject. He says he's never heard of anything like that before, but it might be possible. So maybe it wasn't her. Maybe she is just wandering around in the woods. I mean weirder shit has happened, right? We know that well enough by now."

"Then who was it?" Scott asked. The expression on his face was sympathetic, but disbelieving.

"I don't know," Charlie murmured. "Another werewolf, the boogeyman, hell maybe the Locke Ness Monster decided to take a vacation." The denials sounded ridiculous, even to her. All evidence pointed in one direction. And she knew that it was probably Lydia—she knew that. But that was the thing about hope, wasn't it? It doesn't matter how miniscule that tiny spark was. If it was something that you really and truly cared about, that spark might as well be a forest fire.

Stiles let out a loud groan and pinched the bridge of his nose in frustration. "Okay," he said through gritted teeth. "I'm just gonna blow right past the fact that I think you having these little chats with Derek is a freaking terrible idea and move on to the other bit. Charlie, I want to believe Lydia's fine as much as you do, but is that realistic?"

"Probably not," Charlie acquiesced. "But I'm not quite ready to admit that to myself yet. So can you guys let me cling to that tiny bit of denial for as long as possible?" The expression on Stiles's face softened visibly and he put a comforting hand on her shoulder. He opened his mouth to say something, but before he got the chance the bell rang. "And that means that the two of you are officially late for your morning lacrosse practice."

A stream of loud and exceptionally creative curses spilled out of Scott's mouth and he immediately darted away, dodging through the other students. Stiles on the other hand didn't move at all. He just stood there, staring at her with that genuine, caring look of his. Him and his stupid, stupid face that had to go and make her feel feelings. She didn't know how, but under his scrutiny everything that had happened—Peter, Lydia, her nightmares—they all became more real. Like she couldn't ignore them anymore. At that point it felt like her body was at war with itself, that swooping jolt in her stomach contrasting perfectly with the sensation of irritation that was building up in her veins. She bit her lip and let out a long sigh before speaking. "You're missing your practice."

"I'm not first line," he said with a shrug. "They won't care."

The way Stiles was standing there looking at her, Charlie felt herself beginning to fidget. Even after everything she had been through, she was still a bit uncomfortable when it came to genuine human emotion. There was a lot of that in Stiles's expression at the moment. "Would you stop looking at me with that face?" Charlie muttered, bouncing up and down on the balls of her feet.

"What face?" he demanded. "This is my normal face."

"You know what face," Charlie replied, waving a finger in said face. "It's the same face I always complain about. The 'I'm worried about you face'. You don't have to be worried about me. I'll be fine. Go to practice."

She shoved her hands in her pockets and stared at him for about two seconds before doing an about-face and marching through the door. All of her muscles were tense, making her movements strangely robotic, and her pace could only be described as unnecessarily fast. She was pushing her way through the main doors when she heard Stiles let out an exasperated cry. "Seriously?" he shouted after her. "Are you seriously doing this right now?"

Ignoring that frustrated voice, Charlie continued on her was to her locker. It was just all too overwhelming. Usually this worked—the whole 'pretending to be okay' thing. But that's usually because people would believe her and leave her the hell alone. But Stiles kept poking at her. So she did what she usually did under these types of situations. She ran.

Actually it was more like power-walking, but that was beside the point.

Arriving at her locker, Charlie quickly keyed in the code and wrenched it open. She shoved her head inside and took a deep breath, ignoring the smell of the sweaty gym shoes that were sitting at the bottom. She was subscribing to the 'if you can't see them, they can't see you' philosophy of her youth. She was all alone—just her chilling with the textbooks. And she was safe there. But she couldn't stay safe forever.

"Suck it up Oswin."

When Charlie pulled her head out of the locker, she realized that everything around her was quiet—way to quiet for a packed high school hallway. There should be laughing and chatter and the sound of lockers opening and closing, but there was nothing, like the hallway was empty. Slowly, she turned around. The hallway definitely wasn't empty—there were at least a dozen people there and they were all staring at her like she was a carnival exhibit. Word of Lydia and Allison had definitely gotten around, and as the third Musketeer she was garnering no small share of public attention. Folding her arms, Charlie glowered at the lot of them. "Is there something I can help you with?"

The sound of sneakers squeaking against linoleum and heels clacking against the ground filled the hallway as they began to disperse. Cowards. They were like emotional vultures, circling around someone they thought was wounded so as soon as that person went down they could feast on the scandal they left behind. People were the worst. She was contemplating throwing in a 'yeah, you better run!' but that probably wouldn't have made her less conspicuous.

Rolling her eyes and letting out a bitter scoff, Charlie turned back to her locker and began exchanging her textbooks to get ready for class. The footsteps began to fade as the people began to shuffle away. Except, that is, for that one set of footsteps that seemed be getting louder. It was only a few more seconds before Stiles appeared right next to her. "Jesus, how the hell did you get here so fast?" he asked, panting slightly. "Can you teleport?"

Charlie just made a face and shrugged her shoulders. "Maybe I've just got better cardiovascular health than you do." After shoving her English books into her bag, she closed the door to her locker with a resounding slam and turned back to face Stiles, looking at him pointedly. "You know what could change that? Playing lacrosse. Go to your practice. I'm okay. Really."

At that point Stiles almost seemed to get...angry. He let out a loud groan and slammed his head into the cold metal of the locker next to hers. Something he probably immediately regretted given the fact that he started rubbing at his forehead while his face morphed into a pained wince. "You're okay!" he practically shouted, his exasperation with her cageyness finally getting the better of him. "Fine. Great. Perfect. You're okay. But here's the thing, Charlie. I'm gonna worry about you whether or not you're okay. You can be the epitome of okay, and I'm still gonna worry. That's what friends do. They worry about each other, whether or not they're okay! That's kinda how the whole thing works!"

The words came out insanely quickly—like in the same breath—so by the end of his rather loud rant, Stiles was left breathless. And Charlie...surprised was a gentle way of describing what she was. Stiles had just yelled at her. In the middle of the hallway. Maybe it was hearing his own words echoing in the hallway, but his face crumpled. "Oh, man, I'm sorry. I didn't—that was—I was just—"

"Right," Charlie finished for him, cutting off the apology. "You're right."

Stiles blinked in surprise. He opened his mouth to say something, but then snapped it shut again, repeating that process a few times before finally speaking. "What?"

"You're right," Charlie said, enunciating each of the words carefully.

"I am?" he asked stupidly.

Charlie winced theatrically and shrugged. "I understand why you'd find the idea of you being right so confusing, but you are." Breaking eye contact, she rocked back on her feet and stared at the floor. "I mean, I worry about you too."

"You do?" he asked, an unexpected element of disbelief in his voice.

"Um, yeah," Charlie replied as if it was the most obvious thing in the world.

A tiny smile appeared on his face, making his yes crinkle at the corners. "Like a lot, or..." He let the words trail off and raised his eyebrows expectantly.

"Yes," she muttered, rolling her eyes a bit. "More than I admit to out loud. And probably more than I need to."

That small smile split into a wide grin. "Well I guess that makes you a bit of a hypocrite, doesn't it?"

Charlie let out a scoff and absently tugged at the end of the braid. "Not really," she shot back. "You do so much stupid crap that it's pretty much impossible not to worry about you."

"Hey!" he said, snapping his fingers and pointing at her. "I—I do not have the monopoly on stupid crap. There's plenty of stupid crap going on in this—" he waved his hands around in the space between them "—this general vicinity. You do plenty of stupid crap too. And I mean really stupid. Epically stupid."

"I thought you were trying to make me feel better."

"Shut up," Stiles said, the smile never leaving his face. He looked down the hallway, like there was somewhere he needed to go, before turning back to face her fully. "Can we get the hug over with now? I'm, like, super-late for lacrosse practice."

Narrowing her eyes at him, Charlie pushed herself up on her tiptoes and wrapped her arms around his neck while his found their way around her middle. His shirt was rough and soft at the same time, like it had been washed a ton of times, and he smelled kind of like fabric softener and curly fries. She felt that now frustratingly familiar jolt in her stomach at their proximity. After a few short seconds, she pulled back and smacked him in the chest. "There. Now get to practice before Finstock has a seizure or something. I mean how is Beacon Hills going to get to the state championships if the players keep blowing off practice?"

"You suck."

"You suck more."

With a parting wave, Stiles sprinted down the hallway towards the locker room, his lacrosse stick almost hitting a few people in the face as he went. Letting out a low whine, Charlie turned back to face the lockers. It was her turn to slam her forehead against the metal. And, like Stiles, she immediately regretted it. She was doomed. That was the long and short of it—she was completely doomed. Why did he have to be so freaking sincere and considerate? Was this what having a crush was like? She'd never really had one before, so she hand nothing to compare it to. But then again it had only been going on for like three days. She just needed to learn how to deal with it was all. Well with that and all the other crap going on.

If Charlie was being honest, she might as well have not gone to school at all that day. Her mind was somewhere else the whole time, theorizing. The teachers lecturing at her sounded more like adults in those Peanuts cartoon movies—where they don't actually use words and their voices came out more as static than anything else. And she definitely, definitely failed that pop quiz in chemistry. Not that Charlie wasn't taking any notes. She was taking tons of notes. It just so happened that those notes had absolutely nothing to English, history, French, chemistry, or anything else remotely academic. Nope. She was taking notes on Lydia.

Every minute detail to do with Lydia was hashed and rehashed in her brain. She would close her eyes and visualize the scenes—the hospital bathroom, the Hale house, the graveyard—she recreated each of them in her brain. Or at least she tried to. Every time she focused too hard on the Hale house, she would get those flashes again and be left with a migraine. And one or two people staring at her like she had lost her mind. Still, though, she managed to sketch herself out a timeline of events, looking for some way to definitively prove that Lydia absolutely could not have been the person to take that liver. She didn't.

Most of the day passed with Charlie in a bubble of her own creation. Sure she heard the whispers and felt the eyes on her, but she ignored them. It was fairly easy, actually. Despite the whispers, people seemed to be avoiding her like they were a little bit afraid. But then again she had kneed Jackson in the groin in the middle of a crowded hallway a couple of weeks ago. Maybe they were a little bit scared. She was actually pretty alright with the fact that the universe was avoiding her. She was happy to be avoided.

At the end of the day she found herself sitting in her normal seat in her seventh period economics class doodling in her notebook. The time passed quickly, so much so that the end of day bell ringing was a surprise. And a relief. The sound of chair legs scraping against the ground filled the room as everybody readied themselves to go. Charlie snapped her book shut and shoved them in her messenger bag, making a move to get up with everybody else, but before she could a loud, shrill noise penetrated the air making her wince. She looked up to see Coach Finstock, hands on his hips and whistle hanging out of mouth, blocking the exit.

"Did I say you could go yet?" he exclaimed. "All of you sit." Everybody froze in place, but nobody made a move to sit. Coach Finstock blinked at them, actually looking a little offended. He folded his arms across his chest and glowered at them. "Did you hear me—I said sit!"

The students shuffled back to there seats and Finstock nodded to himself in satisfaction. He paced back in forth in front of his desk, probably to develop some sort of level of intimidation, before talking. "Alright. Listen up you miscreants. The police are asking for help on a missing child advisory. As I'm sure you all already know because of the complete lack of verbal filter there seems to be at this school, there's a sick girl wandering around totally naked. Reports say it's going to get below forty degrees tonight. Now I realize that most of you will probably be locked in your rooms making Facebook status updates and twittering at each other and doing God knows what else on the internet, so I'm providing some incentive for you to get off your asses and do something about it." He pointed almost angrily at a piece of paper that was taped up next to the door. "That's the signup sheet. Anybody who finds the girl gets an automatic A in my class." He stopped pacing and stared at them all seriously. When nobody moved, he rolled his eyes and groaned. "You can go now."

As soon as he spoke the words, the rest of the students jumped back up from their desks. Some of them sprinted right through the door and into the hallway, but at least half of them formed a traffic jam around the signup sheet, holding pens and clamoring for their chance to sign. Charlie couldn't help but feel a tiny bit of disgust build up inside her. They were willing to pretend to care, but only as long as they could get something for it. Vultures. She let out a bitter, humorless snort and slowly got to her feet. She was just about to push through the mosh pit of assholes when somebody's voice stopped her.

"Hey! Oswin!" Charlie glanced over her shoulder to see none other than Coach Finstock waving her over. "Hang back a bit."

Charlie slowly backed away from the door and approached him, her eyebrows furrowed in confusion. One by one, the other students filed out, leaving her and Coach Finstock alone in the classroom. He sat down behind his desk and waved at her to approach. Charlie clutched onto the strap of her messenger bag and walked towards him with hesitation. "Look, Coach," she said as she came to a stop in front of him, "if this is about—"

"Pull up a chair," he ordered, gesturing at the row of desks.

Charlie's eyebrows pulled together in confusion, but she did as she was told. Grabbing a free chair, she pulled it up so she was situated on the other side of the desk and sat down. "Look," she muttered evasively, "if this is because I wasn't paying attention in class today, I'm really sorry. It's just that Lydia is my best friend and she's—"

But Coach Finstock cut off her rambling apology/excuse, leaning forwards on his desk and fixing her with a weirdly serious yet oddly comical stare. "So what's the deal with your aunt? Melody's your aunt right? Blonde hair, brown eyes, chaperoned the winter formal?"

What Charlie was expecting from this conversation, it sure as hell hadn't been that. She opened her mouth to say something, but the only noise that came out was a croaky sounding squeak. She cleared her throat and blinked a few times to make absolutely certain she wasn't hallucinating again. Nope. Not at all. "Wha—what do you mean 'what's her deal'?"

The coach made a weird face at her, like she was the one not making any sense. "I thought you kids were supposed to be down with the lingo," he said, waving his hands around. "What's her deal? Is she single? What?"

This was her nightmare. She had thought it was that crazy dream where Peter tried to kill her, but no. This moment, right here and now, this was her truest nightmare. Charlie gaped at Coach Finstock, completely frozen. It was like her brain was buffering. All she could see was that ridiculous spinning wheel that appeared when the internet was being insanely slow. She didn't know why, but her mouth started moving without her brain thinking.

"Um, yeah. She's single."

A toothy grin formed on Coach Finstock's face and he began nodding to himself. "Nice." He seemed to fall into some sort of trance, but then snapped out of it just as quickly. "So what does she like?"

"What does she like?" Charlie asked stupidly.

"Yeah," Finstock pressed. "You know, interests, hobbies, stuff like that. Stuff that we might have in common. Shared interests."

Slowly, Charlie's brain caught up with the events as they were occurring. She stared at Coach Finstock in disbelief. "Are you—are you asking me how you can get my aunt to go out with you? Is that actually happening right now?"

"What are her feelings on Monster Trucks?" he mused.

The sound of the clock ticking on the wall seemed very, very loud as she sat there in stunned silence. "My best friend is wandering around in the woods in danger of going into hypothermia."

The statement hung in the air, and the level of awkward in the room was increased exponentially. Finstock jerked his head to the side, like he was reconsidering his recent words, and made a face at her. "You should—you should probably go."

Charlie swallowed heavily and nodded. "Yeah. I—I'm gonna go. Over there. Far, far away from here." She stood up suddenly, knocking over the chair she was sitting in. She didn't bother to pick it up before practically sprinting out of the room and down the hallway. All she knew was that she had to get away from that room as quickly as possible. But not quickly enough to hear Finstock shout one more thing after her.

"So was that a 'no' on the Monster Trucks, then?"

Charlie cringed internally and picked up her pace even more, pretending not to have heard. Nope. No. She wasn't even going to start trying to think about that. There was no more room in her brain. If there was one more thing to add to the giant pile of crap that was her life, she would probably just join Lydia instead of just trying to find her.

She needed to get out of that building. She needed to get out of that high school. With the day she had just had, it kind of felt toxic. After what felt like an eternity she finally got to her locker, even before some of the other students in her class that hadn't gotten held back for the most awkward human interaction of all time. She wrenched the locker door and began frantically shoving books in her bag without bothering to look and see which ones. She was just about to slam the door shut and go on her merry way, but before she could she heard something—something she despised. That something being the voice of Meredith Edwards, the biggest gossip in school, whose locker was two over from hers.

"No, so it's totally official," the girl said as she approached her locker. Charlie froze, keeping her face hidden behind the open door to her locker as the girl continued. "Like there's been a police report and everything. The woman is an actual, real-life serial killer! That fire all those years ago? That was her. Plus you remember that bus driver we saw out there? He was ripped to shreds! She did that too."

"Really?" the other girl asked. Charlie could almost see that look of doe-eyed disbelief on the other girl's face. The Disney princess 'I'm so shocked by unpleasantness' face. It made her want to puke, right there in her locker.

"Yeah!" Meredith barreled on, even sounding excited about it. "She was a total psycho!"

"And that was really Allison's aunt?" the other girl demanded. "How is that possible? I mean, she always seemed so nice?"

"Yeah?" Meredith said with a snort. "You know who else was super nice and charming? Ted Bundy."

"Who's Ted Bundy?"

"Um, only one of the most famous serial killers ever," Meredith scoffed. "You know mental illness runs in the family. The crazy doesn't fall far from the tree."

At that, the social bubble Charlie had built up for herself over the course of the say popped. Reaching up, she slammed the door to her locker shut impossibly loudly and leaned against the metal, folding her arms across her and staring at the two girls. Catching sight of her, Meredith froze for an instant before readopting her natural stance. "H—hey, Charlie," she said, trying to seem natural. "How's it going? Your hair looks great today."

"Are we really going to be doing this?" Charlie said, waving a finger at the girl. "Really?"

Meredith sighed and shrugged casually. "I'm sorry. I know Allison's your friend and everything, but it's the truth. You can't get angry at me for telling the truth."

A laugh burst forth from Charlie's throat. It was a bit manic and definitely passive-aggressive. "Oh, I'm not angry at you, Meredith," Charlie said. Her voice was sickly sweet, but came out more threatening than anything else. "I'm definitely not angry with you. Because I understand why you do what you do—all the gossiping and everything. Actually, I pity you more than anything else."

Meredith's spine straightened. Her lip curled into a sneer and she abandoned all pretext of kindness. Basically she was finally being honest. "Really? You pity me? The emotionally stunted, borderline violent girl—yeah, I know about you kneeing Jackson in the crotch—the girl with the disastrous friends with crazy, murdering aunts—that girl pities me?"

Charlie just smiled sweetly and shrugged her shoulders, mimicking the girl's way of moving. "Yup," she said, popping the 'p'. "Because this—" she waved her hand around between the two of them "—this is all that you are. Your sheer existence is completely dependent on other people's drama. And I'll just bet that you wish more than anything that you were the person everybody was talking about. Even if it was your aunt that killed a ton of people. Because that would mean that you—like as a person—it would mean that you were the tiniest bit interesting. As it is now, you're...you're a shallow pool of water. You reflect everything but there's nothing underneath the surface."

"Are you calling me shallow?" Meredith demanded. She tried to fix Charlie with what was probably her version of the 'death glare', but the seriousness was kind of undercut when her right eye started twitching.

"Yeah, sure," Charlie said waving her hand absently. "You kinda butchered my metaphor, but whatever." Narrowing her eyes into a dangerous expression, Charlie took a small step towards Meredith. She almost busted out laughing when the girl took a scared step back. "I might hate this game, but that doesn't mean I can't play it. Lay off Allison and Lydia, or you will see _exactly_ what I'm capable of."

"Come on," Meredith sneered to her friend, never taking her eyes off Charlie. "Let's go somewhere else. Where there's less crazy." Meredith flipped her long, blonde hair over her shoulder in a sad imitation of Lydia and walked past Charlie down the hallway. Letting out a loud snort, Charlie spun on her heel and watched them go.

"Good talk!" Charlie called out after them as they strutted down the hallway. "I'll see you later!"

The two girls picked up their pace a little bit, making Charlie chuckle to herself. But then her eyes were drawn slightly to the left and the laughter died in her throat. Allison was standing there in the middle of the hallway, clutching her books to her chest and staring at Charlie with wide eyes. She kind of looked like a deer in headlights, frozen there. She had heard the whole thing.

The two girls stood there at opposite ends of the hall, staring at each other. It was almost like they were having a silent conversation from twenty feet away from each other. After a few moments, Allison pressed her lips together into a thin line and nodded in Charlie's direction before turning and walking down the hall. It wasn't much of a détente, but it was a start. Allison needed someone to be there for her. Charlie would be there, whether or not Allison _saw_ her there.

And that meant Charlie was going to a funeral.

**Chapter 3 Soundtrack**

**Charlie wakes up and forces herself to get ready.**

**-~-~-~Cops - On and On**

**Charlie goes to her locker and deals with the gossiping and Stiles catches up with her to make sure she's okay.**

**-~-~-~Must I Wait - Yumi And The Weather**

**The most awkward conversation you could ever have with at teacher.**

**-~-~-~I Need a Surprise – The Suits**

**Charlie eviscerates Meredith (the gossip), sees that Allison saw her, and resolves to go to Kate's funeral.**

**-~-~-~The Sailor - Lost Lander**

**References!**

**The 'Who are you and why?' is a reference to one of my favorite TV shows, Psych!**


	4. A & Ω

**Disclaimer: 'Teen Wolf' isn't mine. Shocking, right? But it's true. If there are any similarities in content or dialogue, it has probably originated with the show.**

**A huge thank you to BrightEyes20, winchesterxgirl, Charlie-Charlie-Charlie, YellowSubmarine93, emmy72, ThePreviews, Roxu, she.s. .one, easythrowaway, Daenerys86, CourtneyxWolf725, katiesgotagun, DarlingPeterPan, Cbftologin, Tania, imrid-amrad-ursul, Female whovian, turtlethewriter, Sadedfire, TWsos12345, TheMMMG, Everlastingabyss, nessafly, nixevee, Valkyrie101, Vcarp1993, Montanasmith5897, RedRoses5, vickylopez2994, Gee Brittany, SimplyKelly, chibisemo, X23 Maximoff, SK-Scantenato, Undeniable Weirdness, ssstilinski, Guest, Bookiee, Emmalee Adams, ofmiceandheidi, Guest, Hanna, Shes-The-Proto-Type, WhatsGoingOn, run-robin-run, Bethany, Just-another-teenage-dirtbag, We're All M-M-Mad Here, L.L. Pottle, Micaela M, and AspiredWriterr for reviewing! I love you guys all so much! And, as usual, thank you to the wonderful BrittWitt16!**

**If you want to see the outfits Charlie wears, check out my polyvore account. There is a link on my profile.**

**Oh, and I started a Spotify account for my playlists! I'm not quite up to date with all the chapters yet, but if you want to listen to what I have so far check out the account! My username is...you guessed it...it-belongs-in-a-museum.**

Chapter 4 – A & Ω

Death was weird. Like as a concept, it was strange to think about. The idea that a person—who they were, their personality from their weird habits to their sense of humor—could blink out of existence because of something as tiny and inconsequential as a bullet or a blood clot. All of those indefinable tiny little things that added up to what some people might call the 'soul' destroyed in an instant. And then what was left? A few photographs and a box of random stuff that ended up in the back of a closet because the people that loved that person couldn't quite bring themselves to look at it yet. That was it. A life turned into some cardboard boxes and memories.

But to Charlie there was something that even stranger and made less sense than death, and that was how people reacted to it. Some of them started eating anything and everything in sight, to the point that you had to start worrying whether or not the sheets and sofa cushions would still be there in the morning. Others would start crying and never, ever stop like a fire hydrant whose top was busted off. Then there were the ones like her who didn't shed a tear—the ones like her who just shut down so they wouldn't have to feel that pain. And a million types of others.

The way Charlie saw it, death was kind of like throwing a brick into a perfectly still lake. The event itself was that one giant splash—loud and dramatic. The fallout, though, it was much more subtle. The quiet ripples radiating out from the center until the entire lake has been disturbed, that was the aftermath—that was how death touched everybody and everything around it.

Charlie sat on her bed, her hands grabbing hold of that rumpled, deep purple comforter, and stared out in front of her at the dress hanging from her closet door. It was a nice dress—beautiful even. It was a sleeveless, simple frock with a lace overlay and ribbon around the waist. It wasn't something that she would have necessarily picked out for herself—a little too 'sweet' for her tastes—but Mel had chosen it and that meant it suited her well. And it did fit the most important criteria. It was black.

She never thought she would actually wear that dress a second time. As pretty as it was, as soon as she had taken it off, she had more or less resolved to stick it in the back of her closet and let it rot. But life had been a lot simpler when she had made that decision. A lot had happened and circumstances had changed.

Taking one last long, steadying breath, Charlie pushed herself up from the bed and strode over to the closet and pulled the dress from the hanger. She tossed it carelessly on the bed before stripping off her school clothes and doing a quick change. She slipped on the dress and yanked up the zipper—a process that required quite a few contortions—before finding a pair of grey tights and the lowest heeled black boots in her closet. Stepping back, she brushed the wrinkles out of her dress and surveyed her refection in the mirror. The girl staring back looked perfectly appropriate for a funeral. What was going on in her head, though, was a different story.

Charlie didn't grieve for Kate. Maybe a better person would, but then again she never pretended that she was a 'good' person. It would have been way to big an exercise in self-delusion. She almost wished she could grieve Kate's death or feel some sort of remorse. There was an element of good in everyone, after all. Even in the most twisted of people, there was always that little spark that could lead to redemption. But she couldn't forgive Kate for her actions any more than she could forgive Peter for his. Now that she thought of it, the two of them were soul mates in the most unhealthy way possible. They shared the same wit and sarcasm, the same love of the hunt, and they shared that same burning, all-consuming hatred. If that hatred hadn't been for each other, they would have been kind of perfect together.

But as indifferent as Charlie was to Kate herself, she couldn't help but feel some regret. Allison had lost someone that she had cared about deeply. Yes, that person happened to be a psychotic mass murderer, but that didn't change anything. Allison didn't love that person. She loved the person she thought Kate was. And as far as Charlie was concerned, that meant that Allison had lost her aunt twice in the space of ten minutes. Charlie couldn't pretend to know exactly what Allison was going through, but she knew better than most.

Losing a loved one was kind of like losing a limb. It was like there was a part of you that you always expected to be there and you almost don't _notice_ how much they mean to you because you think they'll always be there. It's only when they're actually, properly gone that you realize just how important they were in the first place. Hell, you could even go through your own emotional version of phantom limb syndrome. There were some mornings after her dad had...There were some mornings when she woke up absolutely certain he would be sitting at the kitchen table, drinking coffee and hiding the comics in his copy of the New York Times so he could appear all cultured. Every time all she found was an empty chair, but there was still that echo in her mind.

"Okay," Charlie whispered at her reflection like she was scolding herself. "Time to be appropriate. The funeral is going to be total chaos. Don't kick the bees' nest this time. Be there, stay on the sidelines. Don't make things worse than they probably already are."

After grabbing one of her seemingly endless supply of leather jackets, she ran out the door and climbed back in her car. Even as she turned the key in the ignition, a tiny voice in the back of her head was telling her that this was a terrible idea. Allison didn't know she would be there, the Argents already didn't like her, the press would be crawling all over the place—there were a whole lot of reasons for Charlie to stay the hell away from that graveyard. But despite all of those very good reasons not to go, she had two very compelling ones that put her in that car.

One: to be there if Allison needed her.

Two: to find out who the _others_ Allison had talked about were.

When Charlie arrived at the graveyard, she was sure to pull up the car on the side opposite the main entrance. The Argents would probably throw a fit if she had just popped up uninvited, and even though there had been a little bit of a thaw between her and Allison, she still wasn't sure if she was entirely welcome. She ended up pulling her car off the road in a manner that couldn't quite be described as legal, driving over grass and dirt until she parked right next to that black, wrought iron fence. And as she climbed out of the car, she was almost glad that Allison wasn't speaking to her. Because that meant that she got to miss out on the three-ring circus that was going on across the rows of headstones.

Chaos wasn't an adequate enough word to describe what was going on the other side of the cemetery. From what she could tell, it was the makings of a blood bath. Photographers and reporters had descended on the scene like a cloud of locusts. Except they were dormant for now. The Argents hadn't gotten there yet. It was just a matter of time until that car pulled up and the locusts started swarming. There were so many, Charlie could make out a couple of khaki uniforms milling around amongst them, making sure everybody was kept in line. All in all, it was utterly ridiculous. Since when did Beacon Hills have so many reporters anyway? There was only one freaking local paper. How many photographers did they need? It was seriously over the top.

Charlie let out a long breath and pushed the flyaway hairs out of her face before perching herself on the hood of the car. Now came the waiting. She rested her elbows on her knees and held her head in her hands, staring out across the cemetery. Its appearance had changed slightly since earlier that morning. For one thing, that huge excavator had disappeared. And then there was that crudely ripped-apart grave. It had disappeared. The gaping hole had been filled in, and the only way she could have known there was one in the first place was that small patch of grass that didn't quite match the rest.

Kate's grave itself looked oddly dignified. It was still, quiet, and totally separate from the chaos brewing a few yards away. The coffin was sleek and silver with black trimmings—stylish with a bit of edge, just like Kate—and stood a few feet away from that clean, carefully constructed hole that had been dug for it. Two lines of chairs covered in a soft green fabric looked over the scene. Charlie felt a small pang of guilt when she realized that there was no way they would all be filled. And whatever dignity the ceremony might have had, it was lost the moment that red SUV pulled into the parking lot. Charlie sucked in a quick breath. Shit was about to hit the fan in three...two...one...

The moment Mr. Argent stepped out the car, the media, which until that moment had remained dormant, sprang to life. Flashing lights, loud shouts, demands for statements—the press practically attacked the Argents using microphones and cameras as their weapons. Allison and her parents huddled together, forming some rudimentary phalanx formation as they forcibly pushed through the sea of reporters. Charlie was too far away to make out Allison's face, but she imagined it held some combination of fear, anxiety, and grief.

Why the hell had she come here? Why did she sign herself up to watch this? It was brutal. It was callous. It was pretty much everything wrong with humanity in general rolled up into one snapshot of a moment. Obsession with the sensational regardless of who it hurts. Not that Charlie could claim some sense of superiority over them. Her eyes were glued to the scene even though she was far away.

The police had to hold the reporters back, keeping them behind the flimsy barricades they had set up in an attempt to keep them away. Finally the Argents managed to push their way through the crowd and into the clear cemetery beyond. They were safe. That is until some kid she vaguely recognized from class broke the unspoken rule and ducked under the barricades, snapping candid photos of Allison. Charlie pushed herself off the car slightly, wondering if she should shout some kind of warning, but before she got the chance, a hush fell over the crowd.

The teeming reporters parted, seemingly almost on instinct, leaving an open path for three men. Two of them were tall, at least six feet, well muscled, with suits and sunglasses. They looked more like a security detail than anything else. But regardless of their height or size, the two glorified bouncers weren't the ones that drew the attention. It was the man in the center of the trio who drew her attention. It wasn't that there was anything particularly striking about his appearance itself—he was shorter then the others, probably in his mid- to late-seventies, thin, balding with shock-white hair. Taking any of the characteristics on their own, it wouldn't have added up to anything all that impressive, but the man she found herself looking at was more than the sum of his parts. He carried himself with a quiet power—a gravitas—that demanded authority without him even having to say a word.

Charlie watched with bated breath as the man strode towards the photographer who had snuck under the barrier. The man stood silently at the boy's shoulder for a few moments while he continued to snap photos, completely unaware that there was anybody watching him. Then, suddenly, he reached down and grabbed hold of the camera, said something to the guy, and snapped the memory card and half. And with that, Charlie came to one definite conclusion. The guy was kind of a badass, and definitely an enigma. For now.

"Hey!"

The sudden voice right behind her made Charlie jump about two feet in the air and almost careen off the hood of the car. "Son of a bitch!" She placed a hand over her heart and gulped down big breaths, trying to get it force her heartbeat down to a regular pace. When it was finally back to normal, she glared at the offending individual. "What the hell, Stiles!" she shouted, smacking him hard in the shoulder. "Why did you have to go and sneak up on me like that?"

Stiles grabbed at his shoulder where she had hit him and mimed screaming in pain. "Wha—how many times to I have to tell you?!" he spluttered. "That's too hard! I bruise easily!"

"Please," Charlie shot back with a roll of her eyes. "That was like 10% power. At most like 20%."

"_That_ was 10%?" he demanded skeptically raising his eyebrows at her. "Jesus! Am I friends with a she-Hulk?"

Charlie folded her arms across her chest and squared her shoulders in his direction. "Did I just put on a frilly dress and frigging high-heeled shoes only to be called a she-Hulk?"

Stiles blinked and took a small step back, taking in her full appearance for what was probably the first time. His eyebrows pulled together, almost in confusion as he looked at her. He let out a funny sort of laugh and scratched absently at his neck before speaking. "Why, uh, why are you dressed like that?"

Charlie frowned and wrapped her arms even tighter around her waist. This was not what she was used to wearing. It was not what she felt comfortable wearing. For some reason the sweet femininity of it made her feel vulnerable—open. "It's a funeral," she muttered self-consciously. "Isn't this the kind of stuff you wear at a funeral? You know, fancy, girly stuff. Socially acceptable stuff." She took a moment to observe his appearance. He was dressed exactly as he had been during the school day—jeans, a flannel over-shirt, and a T-shirt that featured the silhouette of a stripper with the caption 'I Support Single Moms'. She let out a snort and shook her head. "You know what?" she replied, nodding at his shirt. "I totally should have gone the casual, misogynistic route. Much more befitting of the occasion."

Stiles looked down at his T-shirt and then back up at her. "Wha—why do you have to go getting all defensive?" Charlie let out a loud huff and began pulling self-consciously at the hem of the dress. Stiles seemed to sense her discomfort though, because he sent a halting smile in her direction. "Y—you look nice, though," he stammered out, gesturing up and down her body. "I mean really nice. Actually, it's probably a good thing you're not down there 'cause then you'd be upstaging the funeral and that's...well, that's just really bad etiquette, isn't it?"

Charlie bit her lip and bounced up and down on the balls of her feet. "Thanks," she muttered almost reluctantly.

"So why're you up here, then?" he said, waving his hand in the general direction of the funeral.

"I don't know," she murmured, staring off into the distance. "I don't think I'd be all that welcome down there. The Argents pretty much hated me before they knew I was in on all this werewolf stuff. And Allison's still mad at me. Or at least I think she is. I just figured..." Her voice trailed off and she jerked her head to the side noncommittal way.

"Yeah. Yeah, sure, I get it." He waved a hand between her and the action before letting it drop back to his side. "You get to be there without being _there_."

Sighing heavily, Charlie turned back to the scene in front of her. It looked like the older man was speaking with Mr. Argent about something while Allison sat in one of the chairs, staring at the casket. Again, Charlie was too far away to make any of it out definitively. It was completely infuriating, really, how she was so close to the action and not being able to make sense of it. If there was one thing Charlie hated, it was not knowing what was going on.

"Jesus, this sucks," she muttered, kicking at the overgrown grass scratching at her ankles. "This thing with Allison on top of everything with Lydia...It's stressing me out." She turned back to Stiles, frowning slightly and pulling nervously at the end of her braid. "I feel like I'm getting the flu. Is that—is that something that can actually happen? Can you catch like an annoying emotional flu that makes you want to do nothing but lie in the couch and eat but Doritos and ice cream? Is there like an antibiotic I can take to get rid of it? Or an exorcism or something?"

Stiles just stared at her, his jaw hanging open a bit. "Yeah, I'm pretty sure what you're describing is basic human emotion. There's not exactly a pill for that. Well, I mean, there is, but it isn't the type you're talking about."

"Oh, ha ha ha," Charlie muttered with a roll of her eyes. She let out a loud grown and scrunched up her face into a pained expression. "I've just—I've never been in a fight like this before, you know?"

"Really?" Stiles demanded skeptically. "You've never been in a fight before? You? Defensive, sarcastic, punch-y—"

"Okay," Charlie said, holding a hand up to make him stop talking. "You can stop describing me now. I think we all got the picture."

"You know what I mean," he said, waving his hand dismissively. "How can you have never been in a fight before?"

"Maybe I'm just that charming and likable!" Charlie replied, throwing her hands in the air. Stiles raised his eyebrows at her, making her let out a loud groan. "Okay, fine," she muttered. "Look, I've never really had close friends before, alright? If I got into a big fight with one of them I really didn't care. You're not speaking to me? Whatever, I'm moving in like two months and I'll never, ever see you again. But now...I'm stuck with you guys until college. It's the first time I've actually been able to, you know, care about people. Over the long term."

Charlie hopped back up on the hood of the car and buried her face in her hands, rubbing her forehead to stave off the headache that was threatening to form. After a few moments she felt the car sink a bit lower as someone else sat down on the hood. An arm wrapped around her shoulder, pulling her closer to the warm body next to her. She kept her head down for a moment, waiting for that slight flush to fade away before looking up at Stiles. "You and Scott have been friends since your sandbox days right?" she asked. "You must have gotten in plenty of fights. How do you deal with it?"

Stiles blew out a long breath and tightened his hold on her shoulder a little. "I don't know," he shrugged. "I've had plenty of stuff to be pissed at Scott about. Especially these days. But every time it just sort of...went away. After a while being mad and not talking just ended up being worse than whatever happened in the first place."

Charlie bit down on the inside of her cheek and nodded in understanding. "Do you think that's going to be what happens with me and Allison?" she asked quietly, picking at her nails. She glanced up at Stiles under her eyelashes, only to find him nodding confidently. "Yeah," he replied. "That's exactly what's going to happen."

"Really," she said with a light snort. "How exactly are you so sure?"

Stiles just shrugged. "Because there's no way she's not going to end up missing you like crazy."

An involuntary smile formed on Charlie's face and she elbowed him in the side. "Suck-up."

Stiles rolled his eyes good-naturedly and elbowed her back. "Do you want to get closer," he said, like he was reading her mind. "Scott's got a hiding spot behind one of these monument things."

Charlie glanced between him and the funeral a few times before nodding in agreement. "Yeah. Yeah, sure."

Stiles hopped off the car and moved to stand in front of her, holding out a hand. She hesitated, just for a second, before taking it and allowing herself to be hauled off the car. Her heels sunk into the loose dirt, making her stumble slightly as she trailed after Stiles. He followed the wrought iron fence for a while until apparently getting to the right point. Planting one foot on the top of the metal, he tried to easily propel himself over the barrier. Unfortunately that was met with both a figurative and literal snag when his pants got stuck on one of the decorative spires. He fell forwards, almost doing a back flip as he collapsed to the ground. He popped up just as easily and grinned, pretending nothing had happened at all. Charlie let out an indelicate laugh, which she tried to turn into a cough, before starting a slow clap. "Great form," she said, smirking at him. "The dismount was a little sticky, so I'll give it an eight out of ten."

"Ugh, would you just shut the hell up and get over here?"

Cutting off any other of her own snarky remarks, Charlie stepped forwards and put her hand on the metal railing ready to haul herself over as well. At that moment, she realized exactly why she never wore relatively tight-fitting dresses and high heels. It made it absolutely impossible to actually _do_ anything. Frowning to herself, she tried for a second time brace her hands on the fence before Stiles interrupted her.

"Come on," he said, holding out a hand for the second time in the space of fifteen minutes. Feeling a bit like a porcelain doll, Charlie locked down her pride and took his hand again. It took a bit of maneuvering to plant her foot on the rail without flashing her underwear to the world. As soon as she managed to push herself up, the heels made her wobble, threatening to fall backwards. "Whoa, there," Stiles murmured. He grabbed hold of her waist, steadying her as she moved. Charlie's eyes snapped to his, but as soon as they made eye contact she looked away. Between his hand holding hers and the other one on her waist, Charlie managed to make it over the fence without any spectacle. When she hit the ground again, her heels made her stumble again, and Stiles's hands gripped tighter, steadying her. "You okay?" he asked.

"Yup," she said, nodding to herself.

It took a few moments for the both of them to realize that his hand was still on her waist, but when he did, he jerked it back quickly. "Scott's just, uh, he's over here," he mumbled out. Still holding onto Charlie's hand, he dragged her after him across the graveyard. The both of them stayed low to the ground to avoid detection and Charlie struggled to keep up the pace. Heels were definitely a conspiracy. She was sure of that by now. The two of them dodged between headstones until she finally saw Scott peeking at the funeral from around a stone angel. They scurried towards him before skidding to a halt near him on their hands and knees. Hearing their approach, Scott glanced at them over his shoulder. "Hey," he said, looking at Stiles. But when he saw Charlie in tow, he did a bit of a double take. "Oh, hey, Charlie," he murmured, glancing up and down her form. "You look...formal. What are you doing here?"

"Same thing as you, probably," she muttered back. "How's Allison?"

Scott's surprised expression morphed into a concerned one. He let out a sigh and turned to look back in front of him. "Not great," he whispered back. "School today definitely didn't help."

"Yeah," Charlie replied, her voice coming out as a bitter laugh. "People suck."

"You can say that again."

Charlie glanced back in the direction of the casket. She definitely had a better view of what was going on than she did from the other side of the fence. The old man had finished speaking with Mr. Argent and was...hugging him? Something about that seemed so fundamentally wrong. And not he was kissing Mrs. Argent on the cheek? Even more wrong. Super wrong. Epically wrong. And now he was coming to a stop in front of Allison. She seemed kind of hesitant when he came up to her, like she wasn't quite sure who he was.

"Who the hell is that?" Stiles asked, voicing her thoughts and nodding in the guy's direction.

"Who?" Scott mumbled back.

"The one who looks like the old dude from Battlestar Galactica," Charlie elaborated. "And who's freakishly chummy with the parents."

Almost as if he had heard them, the man's head swung around to look in their direction. All three of them swore under their breath and ducked behind the stone angel to avoid detection. Charlie felt her heart beating faster. She wasn't sure why, but there was something about that man that she instinctively feared. Maybe it was the eyes. They were cold and calculating and almost impossibly dark. When she looked at him, she felt like she was staring at a shark. "He's definitely an Argent," Scott muttered.

The three of them waited a solid fifteen seconds before daring to peek around the corner again. After a few more moments of speaking with Allison, the man took the seat next to hers and everybody began finding their places, waiting for the ceremony to start. Allison's head shifted slightly and glanced in their direction. Charlie gave an involuntary intake of breath when the girl's eyes fell on them, but otherwise forced herself to stay still. Scott lifted his hand and sent her a small wave. Allison's lips twitched to form a weak smile of appreciation before turning back to the funeral.

"You know, maybe they're just here for the funeral," Stiles reasoned. "I mean, maybe they're from the non-hunting side of the family. There could be non-hunting Argents. That's possible right?"

"Yeah," Charlie said with a light, bitter snort. "And it's also possible that there's an inter-dimensional vortex that sucks up all the unmatched socks. But it's not exactly likely is it?"

"What are you talking about?" Stiles hissed back. "That totally exists! There's no other viable explanation for where all the socks go. There's a portal in the bottom of everyone's drier."

"Guys!" Scott growled, interrupting the beginnings of one of their patented whisper fights. "I know what they are!" He turned around, leaning forwards slightly and studying all of the newcomers. "They're the reinforcements."

A cold pit began to form in the base of her stomach. "Something's coming, isn't it?" she said, glancing back and forth between Stiles and Scott. "Something not good?"

Before either Stiles or Scott had a chance to respond, two hands descended from the sky and grabbed hold of the back of their shirts, yanking them up to their feet. Charlie let out a surprised squeak and fell backwards, only to find Sheriff Stilinski looming over them, a supremely pissed off expression on his face. "The two of you—unbelievable!" he growled through angry, panting breaths. His eyes were practically spitting rage when they found their way to Charlie.

"Wha—this isn't the squash court!" she said, laughing nervously. "I must have gotten a bit turned around. I'll just—" she pointed off in the direction of the woods "—I'll just be on my way, shall I?"

She was just about to scramble to her feet, but once again Sheriff Stilinski's biting tone filled the air. "Stop. Turn around. Stand." Charlie did as she was told, a self-conscious and guilty wince covering her face. Sheriff Stilinski glowered at her, keeping his hold on Stiles and Scott as they struggled against his harsh grip. "So I'm going to have to start worrying about you too now, is that it?"

Charlie opened and closed her mouth wordlessly, searching for something to say. "Bwah—I don't know about that," she said with a casual shrug. "Maybe—maybe just a little bit of light concern." She held up her thumb and forefinger to indicate, but the sheriff did not appear to be amused in the slightest. "You," he said, inclining his chin at Charlie, "you're coming with me." He turned to Stiles. "Pick up my tie!"

"Sorry," Stiles mumbled as he snatched up the tie he had apparently shoved in his pocket and had fallen to the ground. "I know I'm supposed to ask." The sheriff dragged the two of them across the graveyard with Charlie trailing after them. The entire time a number of harsh and exceedingly creative curses streamed out of his mouth with a rapidity and fluency that Charlie could only describe as impressive. Eventually they ended up in the parking lot. They passed up several in a row of virtually identical cop cars until they found the one that was evidently the sheriff's police cruiser. The sheriff finally released Scott, and reached for the back door of the car, wrenching it open with no small degree hostility. He turned to face the lot of them, a pinched expression on his face. "All of you in." Charlie, Stiles, and Scott all glanced at each other like they were unsure of what to do. The sheriff glowered down at all of them. "Now!"

The three of them jumped and slid into the car. Scott went in first, followed by Charlie, and then finally by Stiles. It was a bit cramped with the three of them stuck back there, which meant that her entire right side was pressed up against Stiles. There was a time not even a few days ago when she wouldn't have even given it a second thought, but now it meant she had that fluttery, nervous feeling in the pit of her stomach. Ugh. It was beyond inconvenient.

The slamming of a door knocked Charlie straight out of her reverie. Sheriff Stilinski had taken his spot in the front seat. He twisted around in his seat and looked back at them through the dividing grating with that same slightly judgmental glare. "The three of you are going to behave yourselves, do you hear me?"

"Sure," Scott answered quickly, nodding at the sheriff. "Absolutely. Definitely going to be behaving ourselves. No trouble here."

"Hey, dad," Stiles called out. "As super-cozy as it is back here, do you think you could, like, crack a window or something?"

"I crack the window when you've earned it," the sheriff grumbled.

Stiles just huffed loudly and folded his arms across her chest, sinking lower in his seat. Charlie sighed and looked around the interior of the car. "I've got to say," she said in an upbeat tone, "this is a nice police car. I've been in the back of a couple of police cars, and this is definitely the loveliest by far. Very very homey. Plus it smells like curly fries, and that's always a check in the win column."

"How do curly fries smell different from normal fries?" Scott asked.

"They just do, man," Charlie replied, waving her hand dismissively.

The sheriff twisted around in his seat, staring at Charlie through the grating with his eyebrows raised. "So tell me Charlie, is this your idea of that 'Beverly Hills Cop' reenactment you were so eager to do?" he demanded through a heavy sigh.

Charlie gave a coy smirk and shrugged. "It might be?"

Scott nudged her in the side again. "What's 'Beverly Hills Cop'?"

Charlie's eyes snapped in Scott's direction, her nose wrinkled in mild disdain. "Hold up, Scott, are you telling me you've never seen 'Beverly Hills Cop'?" The blank expression she received in response made her roll her eyes so heavily they physically hurt inside her skull. "How is it that you've managed to avoid seeing every single awesome movie? I swear to God, one of these days I'm going to duct tape you to a chair, pry your eyes open, and force you to watch them à la 'A Clockwork Orange'." Once again, all Scott's face held was mild, disinterested befuddlement. "You haven't seen 'A Clockwork Orange' either?!"

"Okay!" the sheriff snapped, turning around to glare at them again. "You all are going to be quiet. Now."

"Or what?" Stiles asked curiously.

"Or Stiles gets grounded."

"Wha—how come I'm the only one getting grounded?!" Stiles spluttered angrily. "How is that fair?!"

"I seem to remember having said something about no talking," the sheriff drawled out. "I think I was pretty specific." A tiny bit of amusement found its way into his voice. Given how frustrating Stiles could be sometimes, Charlie got the impression that the sheriff got some sort of satisfaction from frustrating him right back. Stiles let out a loud, annoyed groan and sent Charlie and Scott a warning glance which roughly translated to 'if either of you two get me grounded I will crazy-murder you' and sank even lower in his seat.

The next twenty minutes or so were spent in absolute silence. Charlie continued to peek out the window trying to get a semi-decent view of what was going on in the graveyard, but the plane of vision was too obstructed by the cars and reporters. It wasn't too much longer, though, before people began to disperse, signifying the end of the event. The reporters climbed into their cars and drove off, until only the police cars were left behind to monitor the scene. It actually started to get insanely boring until a disembodied voice crackled to life, emanating from the police scanner.

"_4-1-5-Adam_."

Immediately Stiles seemed to perk up, leaning forwards so that he could hear better. The sheriff reached forward and snatched up the receiver, holding it close to his mouth. "I didn't copy that—did you just say 4-1-5-Adam?" he asked in a perplexed tone.

"Disturbance in a car," Stiles whispered quietly. Charlie nodded in understanding, but her eyebrows pulled together in a confused frown. She leaned forwards as well, eager to hear what came next.

"_They were taking a heart attack victim, DOA, but on the way to the hospital, something hit them._"

"Wha—hit—hit the ambulance?" the sheriff asked, his confusion mounting.

"_Copy that. I'm standing in front of it right now. Something got in the back. There's blood everywhere—and I mean everywhere._"

All of the sudden, Charlie's blood ran cold. The story she was hearing over the radio was eerily familiar, and the scene being described by the officer was unsettlingly close to the one she had witnessed earlier that day. Dead body ripped to pieces and then abandoned. She didn't need to know anything else to suspect that when they looked closer they would find a missing liver.

"Alright, unit 4," the sheriff sighed into the receiver. "What's your twenty?"

"_Route 5 and Post. I swear I've never seen anything like this before._"

Stiles, Charlie, and Scott exchanged looks, like they were having a silent conversation. It took all of them about half a second to come to a definite conclusion. While the sheriff was still talking on the radio, Stiles reached over and eased open the door to the car. Apparently it hadn't latched fully seeing as Stiles had folded up his dad's tie and used it to block it—something else the sheriff was likely to be pissed about come morning. The three of them slipped out of the car easily and ducked into the woods behind the cemetery.

None of them said a word until they were well behind the tree line, out of the sight of any police officers. Stiles and Scott seemed to know exactly where they were going, leaving Charlie struggling behind then in her shoes. Sighing heavily, she looked at her surroundings. All she saw was an impossible expanse of trees, each one more or less identical to the one standing next to it. She would never understand how the hell Stiles and Scott managed to navigate their way through all this crap. She glanced up at the sky. It had turned to a faded grey color, and the sun was sinking closer and closer to the horizon. Not much longer until it sank below the trees, making everything around them dark and cold. And that meant Lydia was running out of time.

"Okay, so what exactly is the game plan here?" she hissed as she struggled to keep up with them.

"The ambulance attack only happened a couple of minutes ago," Scott called out over his shoulder. "If we get there soon, Lydia's scent will still be there. I can track her from that point on and hopefully I can find her before-"

"Before what?" Charlie mumbled bitterly. "Before she goes into hypothermic shock or before she maims someone else?"

"Hey!" Stiles interjected. He put a hand on Charlie's arm, partly to comfort her and partly to steady her wobbly gait. "Look, let's try and focus on the positives here. The guy in the ambulance was DOA. He was dead. That means she still hasn't actually hurt anyone."

"Well at least that's something," Charlie muttered under her breath. She fell silent, deciding to focus on finding Lydia instead of worrying what might be happening to her. Maybe if she just took it one step at a time—divided everything up into compartments that she could deal with—she could actually get through all of it. It took her a little while to realize that Stiles's hand had stayed on her arm, helping her as she tripped over roots and tottered on her heels. She didn't say anything about it—there was no 'thank you' or refusal of help. They just continued on their path.

After a while it got dark out, making it even more difficult to see where they were going. Scott, given all his enhanced vision, led them as they picked their way through the leaves, dirt, and rocks. Eventually, though, there was something other than the sun to light their way. Police lights. As soon as she saw the flashing red and blue lights, she felt like her heart stopped beating. On instinct Charlie darted forwards, almost taking off at a dead sprint. She heard Stiles whisper-yelling her name, but she ignored him and stumbled forwards, coming to a stop as she reached the embankment. She collapsed down on her stomach, ignoring the dirt that was no doubt ingraining itself in the lace of the dress and peeking up over the side. What she saw did not make her feel better.

When Charlie saw the ambulance in front of her, it was like time stopped. She wasn't looking as something unfolding in front of her—she was looking as a picture. And that meant that she could see every single heart-wrenching and stomach-twisting detail. She didn't know who the man lying on that gurney was, but his arms were lying limp on either side of the bed and he had a deflated look to him. Though that deflated look was probably due to the fact that his chest cavity had been ripped open. His torso was drenched in the same blood that painted the insides of the ambulance. Charlie felt her breathing quicken and her vision began to swim. Oh, shit. It was happening again.

Lights.

Fire.

Blood.

Pain.

Screams.

"What's going on?!"

The sound of those words managed to force their way through the fog that had begun to cloud her mind and broke Charlie out of the tailspin she was spiraling into. She shook her head, trying to get rid of those residual feelings and thoughts, and looked around. Scott and Stiles had both collapsed on the ground next to her and were staring at the ambulance.

"What the hell is Lydia doing?" Stiles murmured, never taking his eyes off the scene.

"I don't know," Scott whispered back.

Charlie's breath caught in her throat, but she forced herself to work through it. She forced herself to talk. "Well preliminary evidence would suggest that she's collecting organs," she muttered.

"Okay, she's not collecting organs," Stiles growled, though he didn't sound all that convinced. He let out a shaky sigh and turned to Scott. "Okay, what kept you from doing that? Was it Allison?"

"I hope so," he muttered back.

Charlie ground her teeth together, but didn't say anything. This didn't make any sense on any level. Maybe her doubts as to Lydia's involvement were an exercise in self-delusion, but when it came down to it, the whole thing was still a complete mystery. If Lydia had been turned into a creature filled with bloodlust, why the hell would she seek out and attack two very _dead_ bodies? That wasn't bloodlust. That was desperation. Those were the actions of a scavenger more than anything else. And even if Lydia was a werewolf, she would never resign herself to being a scavenger. She was way too confident for that.

"Do you need to get closer?" Stiles murmured.

Scott lifted his head slightly and sniffed at the cold night air. "No. I got it." He made a move to leave and follow the trail, but before he could get up Stiles's hands darted out and grabbed his shoulder, balling the fabric of the shirt up in his fist. Scott turned back to face him, a concerned look on his face, silently asking what the problem was. Swallowing heavily, Stiles glanced back over at Charlie. His wide, plaintive eyes bored into hers for a moments, like he was trying to dig into her brain and find out exactly what she was thinking and feeling before looking back at Scott.

"Just...I need you to find her," he said, his voice breaking slightly. "Alright? For us...just find her."

Scott's eyes darted back and forth between Charlie and Stiles and he nodded earnestly. "I will," he whispered, filling the words with as much truth as he could bestow. "I will."

Without another word, Scott pushed himself to his feet and took off into the fog and darkness. The way he moved, Charlie could almost have sworn that he was a ghost. The only sound she could hear was the wind howling and the light rustling of leaves. She twisted around, looking over her shoulder, only to find that he had already completely disappeared.

Out of the corner of her eye, Charlie could see the lights of the ambulance and the cop cars still flashing, casting momentary shadows across the forest floor. Slowly, she raised her eyes back up to the ambulance. Police officers had begun to mill around, writing things down on their notepads and scratching their heads while the paramedics that were driving the car continued to freak out. Now that Scott had found the trail, she and Stiles could have easily slipped back into the woods and made their way home, but she knew herself and him well enough to know that there was no way in hell that was going to happen. They were just too damn curious. Stiles seemed to be thinking just about the same thing, because she could already tell out of the corner of her eye that he was looking at her.

"You ready for this?" Stiles asked, inclining his head towards the ambulance.

Charlie bit down on the inside of her cheek until it bled. No. She wasn't ready. She would never be ready. And, weirdly enough, knowing that—that all the time in the world wouldn't serve to change anything—that made her ready. She finally made eye contact with Stiles. He was looking at her with that look he got sometimes, where he was squinting at her and trying to read the lines of her face like a book. It was a look of complete support. Shit.

Sighing heavily, Charlie reached forward and grabbed his hand. His twitched slightly, but then gripped back. "As I'll ever be," she answered with a shrug.

With one last nod Stiles climbed to his feet, hauling Charlie up after him. Their hands stayed linked as they walked towards the scene. Charlie blinked as she walked into the flashing lights. All of the people around the ambulance were silhouetted, making it difficult to distinguish their features, but it didn't take long to identify Sheriff Stilinski. He was the one whose shoulders sagged and whose head rolled backwards as he saw their approach. "You know what?" the sheriff called out, throwing his hands in the air. "I'm not even surprised anymore."

"Hey, dad," Stiles said, his voice going in to a higher pitch than usual. He gave an awkward salute. "How's it going?"

The sheriff didn't respond immediately. Instead he advanced on the two meddling kids and grabbed Stiles's arm, dragging him off to the side of the road, ignoring the pained yelping noise that seemed to be coming out of Stiles's mouth. Charlie's hand was yanked out of Stiles's and she trailed after them, swearing under her breath. When he finally stopped, the sheriff let out a long breath and draped an arm over Stiles's shoulder and yanked his son towards him so their faces were right next to each other. "I really didn't think this was something I had to say more than once, but you can't go around breaking into crime scenes. And Charlie—" he jabbed a finger in her direction "—I thought I made it clear that crime scene tape is not a 'suggestion' or a 'helpful hint'. As far as you're concerned that tape is a forty foot concrete wall with barbed wire and a moat."

Charlie stared back at him with furrowed eyebrows. "Does that moat contain crocodiles?"

The sheriff's eyes widened to the point she thought they were going to fall out of his head like those Halloween prop glasses where the fake eyeballs are attached by springs. Seeing that his father's exasperation was about to reach 'nuclear core meltdown' levels, Stiles stepped forwards a bit, drawing his attention away. "Well technically there's no crime scene tape..." Stiles whispered back, waving a hand behind him. "So how were we supposed to know that is was a crime scene? That's an oversight on your part, isn't it? I mean anybody could just come wandering in. What if some poor, helpless kid wandered in off the street and saw all—" he waved his hands at the ambulance "—all of this? I mean that—that would be some seriously traumatizing stuff. Think of the children, Dad—the children!"

"The children are at home," the sheriff grumbled. "You know, that place you're supposed to be right now. And the uniformed police officers and flashing lights might have been a bit of a hint that this is, in fact, a crime scene." Then his eyes snapped to Charlie, leveling her with a serious look. "And you. Three times in one day? You going for some sort of record?"

Charlie winced and shrugged her shoulders. "I'm an overachiever," she said, the sentence coming out more as a question than anything else.

The sheriff released Stiles and ran both his hands down his face. The exhaustion was obviously beginning to get to him. For a sleepy little town with a small sheriff's department, they definitely had their hands full. "Don't you kids have anything better to do? Like homework? Why are you here?"

Well that was something that Charlie could answer with a single word. And that answer would not invite more questions. "Lydia," she murmured. "We were hoping to find out more about what may have happened to her."

At the mention of Lydia, the sheriff's frustration seemed to falter, shifting instead to sympathy. "Look," he murmured, glancing back and forth between the two of them. "We still haven't found anything yet. We've got civilian search parties combing through the woods, we've got officers on patrol—we're doing everything we can to find her." He sighed and rubbed at the back of his neck. "Look, I'll let you know the second we find any new information. In the meantime the two of you need to get in the Jeep and _go home_."

Stiles and Charlie exchanged a look before turning back to his dad, each of them wearing a guilty expression. "Yeah..." Stiles drawled out, wincing heavily. "Heh—about that...there, uh, there might be a bit of a snag with the whole Jeep thing."

The sheriff closed his eyes for a moment, saying a silent 'why me?' before looking back down at his son. "And what might that problem be."

Stiles let out another nervous laugh and grinned widely. Actually it was probably more of a grimace. "We, uh, we sort of walked here," he mumbled, miming walking with two of his fingers.

At that point, Sheriff Stilinski was pretty much done with the both of them. Charlie had a sneaking suspicion that they were coming pretty close to breaking his brain. "The two of you—" he pointed back and forth between Stiles and Charlie "—the two of you are going to do exactly what you were supposed to do an hour ago. You're going to get in that car and sit perfectly still until I decide that I have the time to drive the both of you back to your cars. Got it?"

"Are you gonna crack a window this time?" Stiles demanded, looking at his dad expectantly.

Charlie could practically hear the sound of teeth grinding as the sheriff glowered at his son. "In the car," he growled. "Now."

Stiles rolled his eyes slightly and made a move towards the car, but Charlie stayed put. Her eyes slid past the sheriff to the scene behind him. Beyond the flashing lights of the surrounding cop cars, she could see straight into the ambulance. At this distance the image was even more harrowing. It looked like somebody had ripped him open and painted a fatal Jackson Pollack piece over the white interior of the ambulance with the man's insides. "What happened here?"

The sheriff followed her gaze to the ambulance and all of the sudden his shoulders sagged. "We're still trying to figure that out. And I would appreciate it if you guys didn't go running your mouths about this all over school."

"Wha—why would you say that?" Stiles demanded, a little miffed. "I keep secrets—I am an excellent secret-keeper! I'm a freaking medieval strongroom filled with secrets!"

The sheriff's eyebrows shot up into his hairline. "Is that so?"

Stiles blinked, and then his eyes darted around like he had been cornered. "N—no. I mean I'm an open book. I'm just saying that I have, you know, the capacity to keep secrets. But me? No secrets." He waved his arm in one long sweep, like he was wiping the board clean or something. "None. None at all. Zip—"

"Is his liver gone?" Charlie interrupted, cutting off what would have turned into a long, rambling speech of charming nonsense. "Is it the same thing that happened this morning? At the graveyard?"

The sheriff sighed and scratched at his forehead. "When are you kids going to learn that information on open cases is not available to the public?"

"Wha—since when are we 'the public'?" Stiles demanded, using air quotes. "Come on, dad! Seriously?!"

Stiles and his dad continued to argue in that contentious but simultaneously good-natured, but Charlie's gaze was drawn elsewhere. She wasn't sure why her gaze had shifted to the forest. Maybe it was because she was trying to look anywhere but in that ambulance. But the reason she was looking in tat direction really didn't matter. All that mattered was that those flashing lights were hitting something that wasn't trees or some adorable little deer.

It was a silhouette of a person. Slowly, Charlie began to walk towards the side of the road. Hope sprung up in her chest, but she tried to quash it down just as quickly to head off the disappointment. But every step she took the silhouette became clearer—better formed. But still, that part of her brain that kicked into self-preservation mode refused to believe it. Soon enough, she was far away from the ambulance—from the rest of the rest of the group. The silhouette moved closer and closer, into the light. It reached up a hand to push a branch out of the way, and then there was no denying it anymore.

"Lydia?"

The word itself was weak and quiet, cracking in Charlie's throat. Hell, Charlie didn't even hear it herself. Her blood was pumping hard in her ears, drowning out any other sound. But just because nobody heard her say it, didn't mean that her words didn't carry any truth. It was Lydia. She was trembling as she slowly walked towards the road, arms covering her chest and wearing nothing but her hospital bracelet and some dead leaves that stuck in her hair. Her eyes were darting about like a cornered, feral animal's. But it was her. And she was okay. Or alive at the very least.

Charlie had no idea why, but she couldn't move. Her brain was caught in that spot between elation and absolute terror, and for some reason that made her grow roots. Nobody else seemed to notice the girl's presence until Stiles got his head out of the conversation with his dad enough to realize that she herself had wandered off.

"Charlie, where're you—" Stiles's words died in his throat when he looked in direction. "Lydia?"

All of the sudden, all of the noise—the voices, the stomping feet—came to a complete stop. Stiles's voice echoed across the street, louder and stronger this time.

"Lydia!"

Lydia's eyes snapped up from where she was staring at the ground, for the first time looking the bystanders full in the face. "Well?" she called out expectantly, lifting her arms in the air and exposing her full form. "Isn't anybody going to get me a coat?"

With that one snarky reply, Charlie felt like her heart up and exploded. She felt her eyes begin to sting as the tears began to well. It was like the dam broke, and her emotions were spilling out of her freaking tear ducts. It was like something in her consciousness had snapped back into place and she had control over her own limbs again. She sprinted forwards, colliding with Lydia and practically knocking her over as she wrapped her arms around the girl. Unlike the one earlier in the hospital, Lydia didn't hesitate to hug back. Her arms wrapped around Charlie's middle, squeezing her hand like she was trying to tether herself back to the world. And Charlie squeezed back just as tight.

"You're okay now," she whispered into Lydia's, trying to convince herself just as much was she was trying to convince the girl clinging to her. "You're okay. Thank God you're okay."

Lydia was shaking with the cold and Charlie held onto her even tighter, lending her warmth. The girl was almost impossibly cold, even compared to the frigid night air. It seeped through Charlie's thin clothes, making her shiver as well. That just made Charlie hold her tighter. It was like she was trying to lend her life force or something.

"Jesus, Charlie," Lydia drawled out, her voice still shaking slightly. "You need to learn how to control yourself around me. People are going to start talking."

"Let them talk," Charlie whispered back, trying hard to keep her voice from cracking with emotion. "I just can't quit you."

"Ugh," Lydia scoffed. "Derivative."

"You complete me," Charlie mumbled back, ignoring the mild frustration in her friend's voice.

"Lame," Lydia muttered. "And plagiarism"

"You make me want to be a better man."

"Also plagiarism. And also weird."

"Nobody puts Baby in a corner."

"Charlie, will you shut the hell up?"

"As you wish."

At that point Charlie wasn't sure what to do—how to proceed. Her embrace was currently the only thing guarding her friend from the cold and from the prying eyes of about half a dozen police officers. Her flimsy jacket wasn't going to make much of a difference. Luckily, Sheriff Stilinski showed up with his own large jacket draped over his arm. "Here you go," he muttered almost self-consciously, holding the jacket out and stretching his arm out almost as far as it could go. Nodding at him, Charlie removed one arm from around Lydia and took it from him. Immediately, the sheriff turned his back to them, blocking the view of the rest of the bystanders and giving Lydia some modesty.

Finally releasing Lydia, Charlie held up the coat, allowing Lydia to easily slide her arms in. "Ugh," she muttered as she zipped the jacket up and removed her hair from under the collar. "Never in my life did I actually think I would be happy to be wearing khaki."

An involuntary snort forced its way out of Charlie's nose, but it died as soon as she took in Lydia's full appearance for the first time. Sheriff Stilinski's jacket was large on her—the sleeves almost completely covered her hands and the bottom hit her about mid-thigh—leaving her more or less covered. But not quite covered enough. Charlie's eyes travelled down to Lydia's legs. They were dotted with an impossible number of nicks and cuts from rocks and branches and her feet were caked with a mix of dirt and blood. Her whole body probably looked like that.

Again, Charlie felt the uncontrollable urge to hug the girl. So she did. And again, Lydia didn't put up the least little bit of resistance. The tears that had been threatening to spill forth finally began leaking out of the corners of her eyes. "If you ever disappear like that again, I swear I will freaking kill you," she mumbled, the words shaking as they came out of her mouth.

"Hm," Lydia replied, her voice squeaky and high pitched. "That seems kind of counter-intuitive don't you think?"

Her words had all the easy confidence that was so typical of Lydia, but her voice was tight and forced. She was scared. And frankly, even though the girl was right in front of her, Charlie was still scared too. Because she got the idea that neither of them knew what exactly had happened to her. They probably would have stayed in that position for a lot longer if someone hadn't gently cleared their throat right next to them. Both girls looked up, only to find the sheriff standing there, his hands shoved in his pockets and trying to be as unobtrusive as possible.

"Look," he murmured quietly. "We've got a couple of questions for you and the paramedic over there is going to check to make sure if you're okay. It'll only take a minute, and I'll take you straight to the hospital."

"Charlie's coming with me."

The words came out of Lydia's mouth so quickly it took Charlie to parse apart what she had said. The sheriff just smiled warmly and nodded. "Of course she will."

Charlie nodded and squeezed Lydia's hand comfortingly. "Of course I will."

Placing a hand on Lydia's back, the sheriff directed Lydia over to where one of the ambulance's paramedics—she was pretty sure her name was Edith—was waiting for her. She watched for a moment as he shone a flashlight in her eyes, checking for a concussion. Finally, Charlie glanced over to her left to see Stiles standing there looking a bit concussed himself, mouth hanging open and staring off into the distance without seeing anything in particular. She rolled her eyes to herself and ignored that small, petty sting she felt before sidling up next to him. "Pick your jaw up, Stilinski," she muttered, folding her arms across her chest. "It's gonna start getting dirty dragging on the floor like that."

Stiles's head snapped in her direction and his eyes widened visibly. "Wha—what?" he stammered out. "I didn't—I mean I wasn't—"

His absolute and total befuddlement was actually pretty endearing. "Calm yourself, Stilinski," she said, elbowing him in the side. He let out a nervous laugh and kept glancing at her out of the corner of his eye, until something in his face changed. The complete joy and relief of finding her faded away a bit, leaving them both with more somber expressions. "What do you think happened out there?" he whispered. "What do you think happened to her?"

Charlie stared off as the paramedic held up his finger, making Lydia track it with her eyes. "I don't know," Charlie murmured back. "I really don't know." She looked up at Stiles. His eyebrows had pulled together in a frown and he was gnawing on his lip anxiously. She put a hand on his arm to reassure him. "I'll take good care of her," she said earnestly.

Stiles's eyebrows pulled even closer together as he looked down at her. "Yeah," he nodded. "I know you will. O—of course you will."

The two of them stared at each other for a moment. And Stiles had a look in his eye that she didn't quite recognize. For some reason she felt like he was trying to tell her something, but she had no idea what the hell it was.

"Oswin!"

The sound of the sheriff's voice echoed against the trees, making Charlie and Stiles jump. The two of them cleared their throats uncomfortably and looked over at him. The sheriff simply waved an arm, indicating that it was time to leave. Then, all of the sudden, it was like a shot went off. Stiles scrambled to the car with a speed that should have been impossible given the amount of flailing involved in the process. He collided with his dad's car with a loud, potentially bruise-inducing thump. His hands fumbled for a moment with the handle before he managed to wrench the door open. Lydia gave him a bit of a strange look as she slid into the back seat and Stiles just gave her a long wave. As Charlie approached the car, the sheriff came up to Stiles with a stern expression on his face.

"Sean is going to be taking you home," he told his son. "Do me a favor and actually stay there this time."

"Yup," Stiles said, bobbing his head. "Absolutely. Stayyyyyyyying put. Not going anywhere."

After sparing his son one last skeptical glance, he turned to Charlie. "You ready."

Charlie took a deep breath and nodded. "Yeah."

With that she slid into the car and Stiles closed the door after her, offering up one last small wave as his dad shoved the keys in the ignition and made the engine roar to life. A few seconds later they had taken off and were speeding to the hospital with the sirens blaring.

Charlie looked over at the girl next to her, trying to gauge her state of mind. Lydia was just staring out in front of her, almost unseeing, with a hollow, pensive look on her face. Charlie got the sneaking suspicion that she was trying to decipher something, which was unsettling. Lydia never had to decipher anything—she always already knew the answer. After a few moment, she noticed Charlie looking at her and stiffened, adopting her usual perfect posture and brushing her tangled hair over her shoulder. "Typical," she said, looking Charlie up and down with her usual critical eye. "The one time you wear a dress I completely approve of, and it's covered in mud."

It wasn't time to talk about it. The little bit of vulnerability shining through in Lydia's eyes was enough to tell Charlie that. It wasn't time to talk about it. Not yet. So she let out a snort and rolled her eyes. "Well at least I'm not naked."

"Please," Lydia said, raising her eyebrows. "I would rather be naked then wear half the things you wear."

Charlie sighed and shifted in her seat so she was looking directly at her friend. "Lydia, shut the hell up while I pick the leaves out of your hair."

"Hey!" Lydia snapped. "Nobody touches my hair but me and licensed professionals!"

Charlie threw her hands in the air, effectively backing off. Lydia made quick work of her hair, her fingers combing through the tangles with a speed and skill that required years of honing. When she was done, she placed her hands in her lap in that prim way she usually did, but this time her fingers couldn't stop fidgeting. Reaching over, Charlie grabbed one of the small, cold hands and laced the fingers together. Lydia exhaled sharply and twitched, but she squeezed back. And then she said something. It was almost to quiet for Charlie to hear.

"Thanks for finding me."

Charlie bit her lip and offered up a small, comforting smile. "You're an idiot if you don't think I always will."

**Chapter 4 Soundtrack**

**Charlie gets ready for the funeral, reflects on everything going on.**

**-~-~-~Pompeii - Bear's Den**

**Going to the funeral and feeling a not insignificant degree of anxiety.**

**-~-~-~Wait Up – Bogan Via**

**Searching and finding the ambulance that was attacked.**

**-~-~-~You Lost My Mind – We The Wild**

**Finding Lydia and driving to the hospital together.**

**-~-~-~Take Care - Tom Rosenthal**


	5. Five by Five

**Disclaimer: 'Teen Wolf' isn't mine. Shocking, right? But it's true. If there are any similarities in content or dialogue, it has probably originated with the show.**

**A huge thank you to 19irene96, Montanasmith5897, YellowSubmarine93, imrid-amrad-ursul, Bookiee, BrightEyes20, katiesgotagun, Shes-The-Proto-Type, Daenerys86, TheMMMG, swanqueen4, bagginsoftheshire666, Vcarp1993, Female whovian, artificial-paradises, Roxu, DarlingPeterPan, AspiredWriterr, nessafly, SimplyKelly, winchesterxgirl, SK-Scatenado, Gee Brittany, Guest, jennifer yo, Emmalee Adams, Liv, X23 Maximoff, WhatsGoingOn, easythrowaway, zvx56, BubblyBanter, Everlastingabyss, Pirate-chan, Tania, Undeniable Weirdness, Aoibhinn, Paranormal Inkfish, BriancyyD, and Guest. Thanks so much! I really appreciate it. And thank you to BrittWitt16 for being a super-genius who inspires me daily.**

**So if you want to check out the soundtracks for my story, I have made a Spotify account for them. You can find a link on my profile. Same goes for my polyvore account.**

Chapter 5 – Five by Five

"How does it feel to be standing on the edge of the cliff that is life, staring into the deep, dark chasm of death that is your ultimate demise?"

"I don't know, Charlie. How does it feel to constantly be making ridiculously labored metaphors and generally annoying the hell out of everybody?"

"Maybe I'm intending to annoy the hell out of you," she replied, a smug smile pulling at the corner of her lips. "Maybe that's my super-diabolical master plan to distract you from the task at hand."

"Well if that's your strategy, you've definitely screwed yourself over," Stiles shot back. "You annoy the hell out of me so often I've built up a tolerance to it. My mind is the freaking Fortress of Solitude." He tapped a finger against the side of his head. "The trash talk? Not going to breach the walls."

"If you're calling yourself dense," Charlie said, poking him in the shoulder, "then I totally agree."

"Oh my God, I hate you so freaking much."

It was entirely possible that the seat cushion of the sofa was now saggy and misshapen, perfectly conforming to her shape like memory foam. It would make perfect sense. She and Stiles had been sitting on that sofa for hours, Xbox controllers in their hands and massive bowl of popcorn sitting between the two of them.

The way Charlie saw it, video games were good for two things. The first was stress relief. There was nothing that could relieve the desire to kick and scream and blow shit up in real life the way that kicking and screaming and blowing shit up in the virtual world. It was kind of cathartic really, even if it did desensitize today's youth to violence. It wasn't like there wasn't enough violence and dead bodies in Beacon Hills without all the virtual stuff. But as invaluable as video games were for her personal stress relief, that wasn't why Charlie was playing right now.

Distraction. That was the second thing video games were good for. It was probably also the reason they were so unhealthy. Before arriving at Beacon Hills, Charlie hadn't been the most social of people. Every once in a while she would binge play Halo for hours upon hours, losing all concept of time until the rising sun sent rays of light stabbing at her eyes. It was a form of mental procrastination that allowed her to check out of life, and right now she could really use that.

Lydia had spent the night at the hospital again. The whole experience seemed a little bit like déjà vu. Mrs. Martin got to the hospital within minutes of their own arrival. As soon as she managed to assure herself that Lydia was, in fact, alright, she proceeded to give Charlie, the sheriff, and pretty much everybody else inside a fifteen foot radius, giant, earnest, suffocating hugs. Charlie had barely known the woman before, but somehow Lydia, hospital waiting rooms, and terrible coffee had turned them into something a little more than random acquaintances, though Charlie wasn't quite sure what.

The doctors put Lydia back in that faded blue hospital gown and ran her through all of the tests again. Physically she was going to be fine. She was suffering from some dehydration, very mild hypothermia, and a few inconsequential nicks and abrasions here and there. Nothing that couldn't be fixed by some fluids, blankets, hot chocolate, and a crapload of sleep. But that was part of what scared Charlie the most.

There was nothing wrong with Lydia. Nothing at all. She was conscious, she was talking, the wound in her side was healing at a perfectly human rate. In effect, she was totally normal. Not that that was a bad thing, but it did beg a very important question. What had happened to her in the first place? What had prompted her to go on her little walkabout? Nobody had any idea. It seemed that Lydia's memory of the past twenty-four hours had been blanked out—she remembered climbing into the shower and nothing after that. The doctors were calling it a 'fugue state'. That meant a temporary bout of amnesia—losing both memories and a sense of personal identity. The full explanation involved lots of highly, Latinized medi-babble that Charlie didn't totally understand, but it left Charlie with one, definite answer. And that was that nobody had a freaking clue what had happened to her. Which meant whatever did happen, it was probably supernatural and they weren't out of the woods yet. So to speak.

And as if that wasn't enough, while the doctors had banished her from Lydia's room while they ran their tests Charlie got 'The Call'. And yes, it did need to be capitalized like that. The information conveyed over the course of that phone call was that shitty. Well actually there was good and bad news, but by the time the bad news was done Charlie almost couldn't remember what the good news was anymore.

Charlie was actually kind of surprised when she saw Scott's name flashing across the screen. He was a friend and a close one, but they didn't really communicate all that much outside of school and...well...Stiles. Which is probably why she answered phone with a very abrupt 'why are you calling me?'.

Turns out she was right. Lydia hadn't attacked any of those corpses. There was another player—another werewolf. An omega...the wolf without a pack looking for a home with Derek. She remembered that swooping feeling of relief that washed through her when she heard those words. Hell, she almost busted out laughing when she heard it. But that gleeful laughter was abruptly cut short. Because that guy she had noticed at the funeral—the one with the shark-like eyes and air of brutality—he was Allison's grandfather. Not to mention a total psycho who cut people—the other werewolf to be precise—in half with a broadsword. Oh, and that code Mr. Argent kept going on and on about? The one where they don't hurt werewolves who hadn't harmed other people? That was out the window. It was open season on wolves. Scott and Derek had just become the Bugs Bunny to the Argents' Elmer Fudd. Except the Argents were actually competent killers.

Crap. Allison was going to have even more family issues now, wasn't she?

After the epically traumatizing 'oh shit' moment that followed that phone call, Charlie forced herself to lock it all down. She went to the bathroom, splashed some water on her face, and made her way back to Lydia's room. It wasn't long before Mrs. Martin fell asleep in her chair. Lydia and Charlie, though, the two of them stayed up late watching TV talking and gossiping about pretty much everything except for the past twenty-four hours. That is until they both drifted off to sleep. Some time well past midnight Charlie felt a small, delicate hand on her shoulder. She blinked her bleary eyes only to find Mel standing over her, a comforting smile on her face. After Charlie extricated her hand from Lydia's, Mel practically scooped her up, put her in the car, and drove until she deposited Charlie in her bed. Charlie wasn't really in the right place to put up much resistance.

Honestly, the school day that followed was a bit of a blur. It was almost like she was sitting still while the rest of the world moved around her. Lack of sleep could do that to you. She had called Lydia between classes to check in, which apparently wasn't entirely appreciated. Given the number of people poking and prodding at her and asking if she was okay, she was probably beginning to feel more like a rag doll than anything else. And Charlie's over-the-phone coddling didn't help that feeling. With each call, Lydia's voice got the tiniest bit more frustrated until finally, just after lunch, Lydia snapped. The exact words used were: 'Charlie, if I feel the urge to go streaking through the woods, _I'll _call _you_. How about that? In the meantime, I'm going to be soaking in a bubble bath until my skin prunes up. So stop damaging my calm and start paying attention in class. We wouldn't want those grades of yours to start slipping, would we?' And with that she had promptly hung up the phone, leaving Charlie with nothing but static. She had gotten the message. Lydia would call when she was ready to talk. Until then, Charlie wouldn't be looking after her. She would be prying.

Charlie didn't pay attention in class. She couldn't pay attention in class. There was just too much for her to think about—to worry about. It was all just so mentally exhausting. In fact, she passed out during seventh period economics—slept through the whole damn thing. Coach Finstock didn't call her out on it or make any effort to wake her up. Charlie wasn't sure whether that was because he knew about what was going on with Lydia or because he was trying to get on her good side before making another run at Mel. Either way, that little bit of sleep should have left her a little bit refreshed. It didn't. Apparently her dreams weren't safe from worrisome thoughts either. Which was why she and Stiles had made the joint decision to shirk all other responsibilities, ignore homework, eat a crapload of junk food, and play mindless video games.

"The inky void is fast approaching, my friend," Charlie muttered, her fingers darting quickly across the buttons and watching the on-screen character moving about carefully, dodging through the obstacles as it closed in on Stiles. "Soon enough you're going to be sucked into oblivion, so get ready for a world of pain."

"That sentence has way too many syllables," Stiles muttered back. "Apologize."

"Sure," she smirked. "I'll apologize for that as soon as I'm done apologizing for brutally murdering your little blue Stormtrooper."

Stiles's hands tightened on the controls and he began hitting the buttons harder. "Okay, I know you're trying to piss me off and get me to screw up by calling them Stormtroopers, but it's not gonna work."

"You sure about that?" It took a few more seconds and button strikes before her character popped up from a rock and blasted Stiles's, making it crumple to the ground.

"Wha—no!" Stiles shouted, throwing his hands in the air. "How—how is that—?" Charlie hopped up to her feet let out a whoop before dancing around in an insanely uncoordinated jig while Stiles shook his head at her. "You look ridiculous right now. You realize that, right?"

She let out a sigh and collapsed back on the sofa, still grinning widely. "That's just your ego talking," she said, smacking him in the chest. She grabbed a handful of popcorn and shoved it into her mouth, almost struggling to chew. "So now I've kicked your ass at 'Mortal Kombat', 'Call of Duty' and 'Halo'," she pronounced, ticking the list off on her fingers and spraying little bits of popcorn all over the place. "Is there something else we've got on the list that you might be better at? How about 'Mario Cart'? Or 'Pong'?"

Stiles let out a spluttering cough and swung his head around to glare at her. "'Pong'?" he demanded, practically spitting with frustration. "'Pong'? Are you freaking kidding me?"

Charlie forced back that grin threatening to form and shrugged her shoulders casually. "You got any other ideas, Stilinski?"

Stiles bristled and glowered at her. "How about Dance Dance Revolution?"

It was Charlie's turn to narrow her eyes and glower at him. "Low blow, Stilinski. Low blow."

They glared good-naturedly at each other for a few moments before Stiles grabbed the controller again and shifted around so he was facing the TV. "Come on, Oswin," he muttered. "We're playing for two out of three. And this time get ready to get your ass kicked."

Rolling her eyes to herself, Charlie picked up her controller and the game began again. Stiles did win that time, but if she was being entirely honest, her head wasn't quite in the game. They used to be able to hang out just the two of them and it was so freaking easy. There was no subtext, no doubt, no hidden agenda, no nothing. They were just friends. Good friends. But now there was always that small twinge of nervousness in the base of her stomach. Her first instinct had been to avoid it at all costs, but who was she kidding? She couldn't avoid Stiles if she tried. And she didn't want to.

Aversion therapy. That's what she had decided to call it. The term didn't make much sense given the fact that she didn't hold any dislike for Stiles—it was quite the opposite. But the principal was the same. The more time she spent with him, the more she would learn how to deal with those pesky little feelings. They weren't going to be going away any time soon, but at least she would be able to control it better. And soon enough everything would be back to normal. It had to be. But there was that little voice in the corner of her head that kept telling her that this whole 'aversion therapy' thing was a giant crock of shit and she just wanted to spend more time with him.

Soon enough two out of three games turned into three out of five turned into four out of seven. There was a lot more shouting and trash talk and more than a few laughs, but Charlie couldn't shake that general feeling of worry. The hours ticked by and the sun began to sink lower and lower before it disappeared beneath the horizon. Charlie won most of the games—she had an almost embarrassing amount of practice playing Halo—but she still lost more often than usual. Her eyes kept travelling to the cell phone sitting on the coffee table in front of her.

Lydia hadn't called or texted since that last time they spoke after lunch except for one quick text telling Charlie that she had been released from the hospital and was going back home. Charlie had texted back asking if she needed anything. Lydia's reply was prompt.

_Quit being so clingy. I know your world revolves around me and everything, but you're going to start embarrassing yourself._

Objectively Charlie knew that if anything had actually happened to Lydia, she would have been informed by now. Mrs. Martin definitely would have told her. But she couldn't stop the 'what-ifs' rolling around in her head. Lydia kept insisting that she was fine, but Charlie couldn't help but wait for the other Jimmy Choo to drop.

When Charlie lifted her eyes from the phone again, she realized the game had been paused. She furrowed her eyebrows and looked over at Stiles. His face was screwed up in an expression that was a strange mixture of concern and comfort. He picked up the bowl of popcorn between them and put it on the coffee table so there was no barrier between them before shifting on the sofa so that he was looking directly at Charlie. "How's she doing?"

Charlie blinked and jerked her head to the side. "What do you mean?"

"Oh, come on, Charlie," Stiles said with a quick roll of his eyes. He nodded at the television. "Your head has so not been in the game. Which either means that you're distracted or you're letting me win. And we both know you would rather gnaw off one of your own toes than _let_ anyone beat you at anything ever so—" he waved his hands "—distraction. Plus you've been looking at your phone once every freaking thirty seconds so..."

He let the words trail off and looked at her expectantly. Charlie squeezed her eyes shut and made a face. Since when was she so transparent? Or maybe Stiles was just that observant. Whatever the cause, it was seriously annoying. Sighing heavily, she pulled nervously at the end of her ponytail. "I don't have any reason to think that she's not okay," she muttered, again staring at her phone like it had betrayed her. "She said she would call me when she needed me."

"And you're wondering why she hasn't yet?" Stiles prompted. "Do you think she's still—"

"I don't know," she said, cutting him off. The words came out a little too loud and a little too quick. Charlie let out a groan of frustration and rubbed at her forehead before looking back up at Stiles. "Lydia seems okay," she said, enunciating the words carefully. "But that's the thing—she wants to seem okay. She's trying to seem okay. I'm not sure if she actually _is _okay." She drew her legs up to her chest, perching her feet on the edge of the sofa, and wrapped her arms around them. "Lydia's so used to being in control of herself and generally everybody else around her...I'm just worried she'll go into a tailspin instead of admitting that she doesn't have everything together. That she won't come to me. She's not very good at letting other people help her."

Stiles let out a small scoff and rolled his eyes dramatically. "Oh, gee," he proclaimed sarcastically. "I've never, ever met anybody else like that before."

"Hahaha," Charlie drawled back, wrinkling her nose at him. "I get it. I'm scary and defensive and cagey. I know that. But I'm not the one who was in a coma because she was bitten by a marauding werewolf. I'm just—I'm a bit freaked out, okay? I've got no idea how to help her because I've got no idea what the problem is yet. Hell, I don't even know if there is a problem!"

"Hey." Stiles reached out and placed a comforting hand on her arm, making Charlie's eyes snap to his. She almost resented those amber-colored eyes of his. They made her feel safe when she had no right to feel safe. "Look," Stiles continued, "if Lydia needs help, we'll help her. We'll always help her. But we can't see into the future, okay? If we start trying to, we're all just gonna go freaking crazy."

Charlie let out an indelicate snort and shook her head. Between the intermittent hallucinations and her persistent and irritating dreams of Peter Hale, she wasn't entirely certain she wasn't already going crazy. Which apparently made her a bit of a hypocrite because she didn't intend on letting anybody else in on that until she knew exactly what was going on. "I know," Charlie mumbled, nodding at him. "I'm just not so good at the whole 'not worrying' thing when it comes to Lydia. Not to mention all the other crap going on. I mean the full moon's tomorrow."

A theatrical wince covered Stiles's face. "Aw, man! Why'd you have to go and remind about that? You totally just took a giant dump on all the fun we were having."

"Well I don't know about you," Charlie drawled out with a roll of the eyes, "but when one of your friends starts sprouting terrible looking facial hair, fangs, and creepy-ass claws, not to mention howling at the moon, you tend to make a mental note. Are you seriously saying you haven't been thinking about that all day? Because I'll bet those rusty little cogs in your brain—" she lifted a finger to her head and waved in a circle "—they've been turning all day."

"Hey!" Stiles spluttered, jabbing a finger at her. "The cogs are not rusty! They are perfectly lubricated!" Hearing his own words, he scrunched up his face into an expression of distaste. "Okay, that sounded...not like I meant it to sound."

"I'll do my best to un-remember it," Charlie deadpanned, "but I'm not making any guarantees. It was kind of hilarious and I may or may not be bringing it up all the time."

Stiles let out a groan and pinched the bridge of his nose. She knew exactly what he was thinking about, because she was thinking about the exact same thing. Last time Scott's time of the month rolled around, he turned into a total dick, not to mention tried to kill several people, including Allison. He hadn't exactly won any gold stars for self-control. "Man, I'm just not sure what we're gonna do. I mean I don't know if you remember last time, but it didn't go so well. I mean, what if this time it's 'Scott's A Psycho Version 2.0, now with broadswords!'" His mouth dropped open and he shook his head with that twitchy sort of energy he always had when he got worked up about something. "I—I mean who the hell carries broadswords?" he demanded, waving his hands about. "What the hell is the point of a broadsword? What is this—friggin' King Arthur's court? They're insanely heavy, blunt, and how the hell are you supposed to hide one when you're carrying it around! It's totally impractical!"

"You Googled 'broadsword' didn't you?"

"Yes, I did, but that's not the point!" he spluttered. "This dude's operating based on style points alone. What the hell kind of a person does that?"

Charlie sighed and ran her hands down her face. What kind of man did things like that? It was a good question. Not a good man. Not an honorable man. Not a man troubled by something so mundane as morality. And finally, a man who was preoccupied with showmanship—the broadsword and the funeral were enough to demonstrate that. "A malignant narcissist," she murmured after a few seconds consideration.

"Malignant narcissist," Stiles muttered, nodding along with the words as he pronounced them. "That's not so comforting, Charlie."

"It wasn't supposed to be comforting," she replied with a shrug. "Kate came from somewhere."

Stiles snapped his fingers and pointed at her sarcastically. "Again, not making me feel better."

Charlie released her legs from where they were still pulled to her chest and shifted so that she was sitting cross-legged on the couch, facing Stiles. "Look, that old crazy dude—Gerard or whatever the hell his name is—he doesn't know about Scott."

"Yeah," Stiles protested, "but Allison's parents do."

"I don't like Mr. Argent, but he is a man of his word," Charlie assured him. "He's not going to give Scott up."

"Unless he catches Scott and Allison together," Stiles reminded her.

"Right," Charlie said, nodding reluctantly. "Unless the nighttime lovers get caught."

"Okay," Stiles replied, waving his hands around a bit. "Am I the only who's really friggin' tired of the whole 'Romeo and Juliet' thing going on with the two of them? It's exhausting, and kinda annoying."

"Yeah, I'm pretty sure they're tired of it too," Charlie said, raising her eyebrows at him. "The whole death threat thing must be a total drag."

"O—okay," Stiles said with a roll of the eyes and holding up a hand to get her to stop talking. "Alright, judge-y. Let's just focus on keeping Scott from getting hacked in half. I'd really rather not have my best friend be drawn and quartered."

"You get chopped into four pieces when you're drawn and quartered," Charlie pointed out.

Stiles let out a scoff and stared at her, looking mildly scandalized. "What are you—the freaking encyclopedia for medieval torture?"

"Okay, one," she said holding up a finger. "I read. Big freaking reveal. And two, it's called drawn and _quartered_. Quartered literally means divided into four. It's not rocket science."

"Alright," Stiles muttered rolling his eyes. "Can we just agree that we need to help Scott not become a raging lunatic and wander straight into the crosshairs of an old, crazy guy with a broadsword?"

"Okay," Charlie said with a definitive nod. "Let's do that."

Stiles stared off into space and rubbed at the back of his head, putting his 'thinking face' on. "Okay, so nobody who's super-into hemi-corpo-thingys knows about Scott, right?" he reasoned. "So we just need to make sure he stays out of sight for the night. End of story."

"Sounds reasonable," Charlie agreed. "How're we going to keep him out of sight?"

Stiles jerked his head to the side noncommittally. "Same thing we did last time. Except, you know, it works."

Charlie blew out a long breath and shrugged. "Okay. This is an excellent plan. I am officially excited to be a part of it." She raised a hand in the air expectantly. "High five for competency?"

"High five for competency."

They slapped their palms together, giving rise to a loud clapping noise. Soon enough, though, the clapping noise faded away, leaving the two of them alone, with nothing but them and their thoughts. And for the first time Charlie could recall, neither of them could think of anything to say, leaving them in silence. But, weird enough as it might sound, the silence wasn't quiet. It was like there was a hum, like that residual electrical sound you hear right after you turn off the television off.

Tension. Audible tension. It was the exact kind of thing that she was trying to avoid in the first place. She and Stiles were fine when they had something to talk about—which, admittedly, was like 95% of the time—but every time the conversation fell into a lull, every time she felt like she _should_ be talking, there was this...weird vibe. And she was pretty sure Stiles was beginning to pick up on it, and that couldn't lead to anything good. So she did the only thing she could think of. She grabbed a handful of popcorn in her mouth and began chewing frantically. Not talking was a lot easier if you had an excuse in the first place. Unfortunately, those fluffy, white, popped kernels melted in her mouth, leaving with her with no excuse. So instead she snatched up the controls to the Xbox and turned back to the TV, nodding at him. "Ready to be destroyed?"

Then a weird look crossed Stiles's face. His eyebrows drew together almost imperceptibly and his jaw twitched for a moment. He almost looked...disappointed? No. That didn't make any sense. Charlie waited for a few moments, unsure of what to do next. He cleared his throat and scratched absently at his forehead. "Yeah," he muttered, glancing back at the screen. "Yeah, sure."

The two of them slipped pretty easily back into the routine of video games and semi-incoherent trash talk, but Charlie felt like something had changed. It was like she was highly aware of herself and her surroundings—everything had been heightened. And more than anything else, she was aware of how close Stiles was sitting to her and the fact that they were very much alone. Ugh. Crushes were the worst. Maybe that was why they were called 'crushes' in the first place. Because they were soul-crushingly annoying and inconvenient.

After another half-hour and a full bowl of popcorn, Charlie heard the sound of a key being turned in the lock. The door swung open and a tall, khaki-clad figure stepped through. "Stiles, you'd better be here," the sheriff called out as he entered. "I swear, if you're crashing another crime scene you and I are going to have a sternly-worded conversation about professional ethics and how you're going to stop being a pain in the ass."

Stiles paused the game and straightened, cocking his head to the side so that he could hear better. "Are you saying there's another crime scene?"

A loud sigh echoed through the halls as the footsteps approached. "I know you register the words," the sheriff called out at his son, "but I don't think you're really listening." The footsteps continued to draw nearer until finally the sheriff appeared in the doorway to the living room. At the sight of the two teenagers, he let out a quiet groan and folded his arms across his chest. Charlie took a few seconds away from the game to shoot him a smile and a salute. The sheriff responded to her smile with a sardonic smirk and nodded at her. "Charlie. Why am I surprised that you're here?"

"Not sure," Charlie replied with a shrug. "I'd say it's a combination of work-induced exhaustion and lack of foresight."

"Really?" Sheriff Stilinski said, pointing back and forth between the two of them. "Because I was going to say it had more to do with the fact that it's a school night and you've got homework to do."

"Nah," she drawled out, never taking her eyes off the game. "It's definitely the exhaustion thing. It happens to the best of us—don't beat yourself up about it."

The sheriff let out a snort of either amusement or exasperation. Probably both. "I can assure you that wasn't my intention."

"Great, Dad," Stiles mumbled absently. His eyes were locked on the screen, where he was desperately trying to ward off Charlie's onslaught as she fired on him. "That's good to hear." His fingers few across the controller and he leaned to the side, like he was trying to physically control the movements of the little guy on the screen. The bloody battle was just reaching its deciding moments—both players with equal chances of winning and losing—when all the sudden two disembodied hands descended from somewhere above them and grabbed those deceptively powerful bits of plastic out of their hands. What happened next could only be described as a cruel, senseless waste. Both players moved into each other's line of fire, and both of them fell to the ground, dead. Stiles gaped at the screen like he had just personally experienced one of the scenes in 'Saving Private Ryan'. "D—dad!" he spluttered. "How could—I mean why would you do that?! I was just about to destroy her!"

"Sure you were," Charlie drawled out in a sarcastic tone. "That was _exactly_ what was about to happen."

Stiles rounded on her, his eyes narrowed. "Um, yeah I was," he said, gesturing at the screen. "I totally had you on the run! You were like two seconds from dying!"

Charlie assembled her features into an artificially quizzical expression. "Yeah," she quipped abruptly, raising her eyebrows at him. "That's what I just said."

Stiles blinked at her, opening and closing his mouth in confusion. "Y—yeah, but—" All of the sudden the sheriff's head ducked down so it was directly between Charlie and Stiles, making the both of them jump with surprise. "Gah! Oh my G—God!" Stiles shouted. He slammed his fist into the arm rest and glowered at his father angrily. "Seriously?! What the hell was the point of that?!"

"Oh," the sheriff drawled out, no small amount of sarcasm in his tone. "You're looking for a point? How about this for a point? Charlie here is going home, and you're finishing all your homework for the next month, all in one sitting. How does that sound?"

"They never give us homework more than a week in advance," Charlie deadpanned.

Another exasperated sigh later, the sheriff fixed Charlie with his innocuous glare. "Well then I guess he's doing a week's worth of homework. I suggest you do the same."

Charlie quizzically narrowed her eyes at the sheriff. "Is that your way of telling me it's time for me to leave?"

"I've already told you it's time for you to leave," the sheriff replied drily.

Charlie took a moment to look back and forth between the sheriff and Stiles. The sheriff's eyebrows were raised, seemingly frozen in place into that 'I am parenting effectively' expression some adults seem to get. Stiles on the other hand was rubbing at his forehead and sighing loudly in frustration. Charlie pressed her lips together in a thin, bemused smile and nodded. "Yeah, I'm gonna—" she jerked her thumb in the direction of the door "—I'm just gonna go."

Stiles blew out a long breath, puffing out his cheeks dramatically. "Fine," he mumbled in an oddly dejected tone. "Let's go." He moved to get to his feet, but as he tried to stand his father planted a hand on his shoulder and forced him back down into an uncoordinated heap.

"The two of you have a habit of not going where you're supposed to go," he said, glancing back and forth between the two of them. "I'll walk Charlie to her car. You are going to go upstairs and sit at your desk until I am satisfied that you have finished all your work."

The sheriff finally straightened up and stared down from what felt like an impossible height. Charlie got to her feet and grabbed her messenger bag off of the floor before giving Stiles a reluctant salute. "See you tomorrow, Stilinski," she muttered.

Stiles opened his mouth to respond, but before he got the chance to say anything, Sheriff Stilinski interrupted loudly. "Yes, he will," the sheriff drawled out. "And I'm sure he's looking forward to it."

Stiles let out a small, grumbling sigh and the sheriff planted a hand on Charlie's shoulder, physically steering her towards the door. "At least I didn't break and enter this time," she said, looking up at the man with a cheeky, but hesitant grin.

"Well at least that's some progress," the sheriff sighed.

As they approached the door, the sheriff opened it for her and pushed it wide open. Charlie nodded in thanks and turned to close the door, but the sheriff stepped over the threshold as well giving her a pointed look. Charlie furrowed her eyebrows at him curiously, making him fold his arms across his chest. "Oh, I'm going to be standing here until you get in that car and disappear down the road," the sheriff assured her.

Charlie let out an exasperated groan and rolled her eyes slightly before making a beeline for where her car was parked across the street. She fished the keys out of the bottom of her messenger bag and unlocked the car before dropping into the driver's seat. After turning on the engine, she rolled down the window and shot the sheriff a sarcastic look. "Satisfied?"

"Almost."

She revved the engine a couple of times. "How about now?"

The sheriff planted his hands on his hips and rolled his eyes at her. "Are you actively trying to be a pain in the ass?"

Charlie pursed her lips and shrugged. "Usually." Sheriff Stilinski shifted on his feet, adopting a more imposing stance, so Charlie lifted a single hand to stop the onslaught. "Okay, okay, I'm going." Charlie reached down to put her car into gear. She was just about to take off down the street, but then her mind drifted back to something else—something she comprehend forgetting, even for the briefest amount of time, even with everything that was going on around her. She tugged nervously at the end of her ponytail before looking up at the man again. "I—I need to say something before I go."

The sheriff sighed in exasperation and scratched at his forehead. "Are you actually doing this right now, Charlie?" But the stern expression on his face changed as soon as the solemn one on hers. He let out another, softer sigh and leaned forwards, bracing his arm on the roof of her car so they were almost face-to-face. "What is it?"

"Isaac Lahey," she prompted.

"Yeah," the sheriff said, bobbing his head slightly. "What about him?"

"His—" she gestured at her face "—his black eye? It wasn't a lacrosse accident."

Sheriff Stilinski's eyes fell shut for a moment, and when he opened them again Charlie saw regret, but not surprise. He had been thinking along the same lines. She could tell. "You sure?" he asked, looking at her seriously. Charlie just pressed her lips together in a thin line and nodded. "How sure?"

"Fairly to pretty damn."

"You got proof?"

"Nope."

The sheriff's hand balled up into a fist and he slammed it hard against the roof of the car, making Charlie jump. "Okay," he murmured, rubbing at his forehead. "I'm gonna—I'm gonna look into it. I promise you that."

"Thank you."

With one last shared nod of mutual understanding, the sheriff rapped his knuckles against the metal of the car. "It's time for you to get going."

And, finally, Charlie agreed with him. She threw the car into the correct gear and took off down the street. Once she made it to the wooded roads, she yanked out the hair tie holding up her hair, letting it spill down on her shoulders, rolled down both of the windows, and cranked up the music. The way the wind hit her face and ripped through her locks made her feel like she could breathe again. Like she was free.

Charlie wasn't quite sure why, but for the past couple of days she felt like she had been living in a cage. It wasn't anything tangible that had suddenly boxed her in. Fear, emotion, uncertainty—they were all so much more...present. Like they were looming in the corner, lurking in the shadows, out of sight but always present. That prison they created for her—in her mind it looked a lot like the living room of the Hale house. And her jailer was the full moon that, not long ago, she had found so beautiful.

When Charlie finally pulled up in front of her house, her eyes travelled up to look at the sky above her. Beacon Hills was a pretty small town, so she could see the stars better than in most of the other cities where she had lived. There wasn't that halo of lights and thick layer of smog between her and the sky. The moon hovered above her. She wasn't sure how, but it seemed bigger in Beacon Hills than it had anywhere else, and it was almost full. It was kind of funny, really. From her perspective the thing would increase in size by less than a millimeter, and all the sudden everybody went batshit crazy.

Ripping her eyes away from the obnoxious glowing sphere above her, Charlie directed her gaze towards the other object of her worries. The house across the street. Lydia still hadn't contacted her, leaving her with that twinge of worry in the pit of her stomach, but she soon felt that swooping feeling of relief. The lights were on in her friend's room, and even from across the street Charlie could see her holding dresses up to her form and casually tossing them aside into what was probably a giant, mountainous pile.

Charlie knew that Lydia was putting in a special amount of attention when it came to choosing her clothes for the next day at school. Charlie understood how that girl's brain worked. And she knew that she was scared. That little 'episode' of hers had inspired a lot of gossip. What had happened? Was she crazy? Stuff like that. So Lydia was going to prove them all wrong. She was going to be perfect. A big part of Charlie wanted to go up those stairs and tell her that everything would be okay—that she shouldn't worry. That's what friends did, right? But it wasn't something Lydia would appreciate. Charlie being there would be a burden more than anything else. Lydia didn't like being vulnerable in front of other people. Hell, even when she was with Charlie the only time she ever let anything 'human' shine through was when there was a near-death experience or something with equally disastrous repercussions. No, Charlie being there would just stress her out more.

As she made her way up to the stairs, Charlie dragged her feet. They felt heavier somehow, like they were encased in lead. Everything about her felt heavier. And slower. Though that might have had something to do with the fact that she had hardly slept over the past few days.

To her surprise, Charlie actually followed Sheriff Stilinski's advice. As soon as she got home, she hauled herself up to her room, cranked up the music, and put all of her books on the corner of her desk in a neat stack except for that one that she opened in front of her. Charlie didn't look at a clock once that night. The only was she tracked the time was by watching the stack of books next to her slowly shrink in size. One by one she dropped them on the ground next to her chair. As it turned out, schoolwork was a pretty good distraction too. All those facts and equations were something that she _had_ to learn, so she forced herself to think about that instead of something else. At some point Mel showed up and dropped off a plate of fettuccini alfredo from _Corleone's_, but that ended up just being shoved to the back of her desk completely untouched.

To the outsider, Charlie would have just looked like she was studious. Probably a little frantic, tightly wound, and obsessive, but the studious type of obsessive. The type of obsessive that was marginally socially acceptable. Charlie wasn't sure how she fought off the sleep. She had gotten about seven or eight hours of shut-eye over the past week and her eyelids were drooping, but she fought to keep them open anyway. Some time around midnight Mel stuck her into the room and fixed Charlie with her 'parenting' stare.

"Seriously?" she demanded, narrowing her eyes at Charlie. "I know I'm supposed to be all happy that I'm the guardian of one of the only kids on the planet who is actually diligent with her studies, but this is getting ridiculous. Charlie, you've had an impossible couple of days. It's time for you to go to sleep."

"Sleep? Who needs sleep?" Charlie mumbled back, sketching out some trigonometry problems in her notebook. "Sleep is for the weak."

Mel let out a musical sigh. She moved into the room, giving that disembodied head a plushy robe-covered body and perched on the edge of the desk, hovering above Charlie as she continued to work. "You sure about that?" she asked archly. "I'm pretty sure sleep is for the people who want to avoid having a nervous breakdown." She let out a wistful sigh and stared out across Charlie's bedroom, a cloudy expression in her eyes. "I remember when I was working on my final project for design school I didn't sleep for like two weeks. I was basically running on chocolate and coffee. Then one day I was walking home with some friends and I saw the wind blow the hat off an old man's head. I started ugly crying—tears, splotchy face, flem everywhere—and I was going on and on about how we're all alone in the world." She clapped a hand on her niece's shoulder and gave her a serious look. "Trust me, Charlie. You never want to be that person."

"Is there a video tape?" Charlie asked, raising her eyebrows. "I feel like that's something I should see for myself."

"Charlie—"

"I'm sorry," Charlie said, turning back to her notebook. "I just—I...Look, with everything that's going on, I've fallen behind in some classes. I'm just trying to catch up."

Mel didn't say anything in response. She just walked over so she was standing next to Charlie, reached down, and closed the notebook on the pencil that was still darting across the page. "I was in the middle of a problem," Charlie grumbled, flipping the notebook back open. Mel just reached back down and closed it again, making Charlie glower up at her. "I've just got a little bit more to do."

"The date in the corner of that page was for next Monday," Mel drawled out. "I'd say you're caught up enough." Then Mel did something strange. She dragged Charlie's chair back, away from the desk and got down on her hands and knees and started grappling around underneath.

"Um, Mel?" Charlie demanded, staring at her in confusion. "What the hell are you doing?"

Mel yanked hard on some sort of wire and all of the sudden the lamp on her table blinked out. Then clambering up to her feet, Mel grabbed hold of the lamp itself. "I'm taking this with me," she said, waving the lamp in Charlie's face. "And if I don't see the lights off in five minutes, I'm taking the light bulbs too."

Without another word she spun on her heel and marched out of the room, slamming the door behind her with conviction. Charlie groaned loudly and let her head fall forward, landing on the now-closed math book with a heavy thunk. Reluctantly, she got up from her desk and changed into the oversized Winnie the Pooh T-shirt she used as pajamas before pulling back the covers and sliding into bed. Her eyes were aching, calling out for her to shut them and just go to sleep, but as soon as her head hit the pillow she felt the anxiety set in.

Charlie didn't want to go to sleep. The studying had been more of an excuse than anything else. She knew that she had to go to sleep eventually—she knew that. But she also knew that what was waiting for her on the other side of consciousness filled her with worry. Plus it annoyed the hell out of her. Eventually, though, she couldn't fight the exhaustion any longer. Her heavy eyelids finally shut and she drifted off to sleep.

_Warmth. That was the first thing she felt. The next thing was the wet sand underneath her feet. She wriggled her toes in it, but then a rush of cool water hit her at the ankles. As it receded, it pulled the sand from under her feet, making her sink a little to the ground. At first everything she heard sounded like it was from far away, but slowly it grew louder. Crashing waves and seagulls. She was on the beach._

_Charlie opened her eyes and found herself staring off across a wide expanse of ocean. It was a beautiful shade of turquoise—the type that couldn't be recreated by paint or even by photographs. But even as she stared out at it, she couldn't appreciate it as she should. She was waiting for the inevitable sound of doom and gloom._

"_Finally, a dream worth having," a voice announced from behind her._

_Charlie's eyes fell shut again and she swore under her breath. Doom and gloom was already here. She gritted her teeth and slowly turned around. When she opened her eyes again, she saw exactly what she expected to see. Though admittedly not how she expected to see it._

_Peter Hale. That asshole had apparently turned into a freaking fixture in the mind of Charlie Oswin. Only this time was a bit different. He was lounging in a beach chair, still wearing the exact same clothes he had died in—crimson red shirt, black dress pants, and a black leather trench coat. The only thing new was the sunglasses. And the Mai Tai in his hand, complete with the brightly colored mini-umbrella._

"_Now this," Peter said, spreading his arms out wide, "this is the type of life I should be living. You know, if I was still alive, that is. But really—" he gestured up and down his body "—you couldn't have given me some new threads? This is hardly contextually appropriate."_

_Charlie rolled her eyes and squared her shoulders against him. "Oh, I'm terribly sorry," she drawled out sarcastically. "Are you feeling uncomfortable? Please excuse me while I curl up into a ball and rock back and forth, weeping with regret."_

_Peter let out a sigh and rolled his eyes in turn. "There's really no need to be so dramatic," he murmured in a patronizing tone. The two of them stood there for a moment, her glowering and him staring serenely. Eventually Peter clucked reprovingly and shook his head at her. "Honestly, Charlie, this is so unnecessary. Please, just take a seat."_

_It was if a chair had appeared out of thin air. Charlie couldn't remember there being a chair next to him before. But she couldn't remember there not being a chair either. She blinked at it in confusion. Either it had been there all along, or it had been conjured especially for her, and she had no idea which. "Oh, just sit," Peter whined loudly. "Watching you standing there all silent and stupid is pointless, not to mention irritating."_

_Her jaw twitched, but Charlie still reluctantly walked forwards and took a seat next to him. She didn't want to find the cushions of the chair comfortable or the sound of the crashing waves soothing, but she did. It almost felt like it was lulling her to sleep. A dream within a dream—what would that feel like?_

"_Mai Tai?"_

_Like the chair, the drink, its fancy glass, and its freaking pineapple wedge, it had appeared out of thin air. Peter's grating voice reached her ears one more time. Great. She couldn't catch a break even when she was asleep. "Get that thing out of my face," she growled._

"_Ugh, must you always be so combative?" he groaned loudly. "What is it with self-righteous people? They can never allow themselves to have a good time! It's a dream, just take the freaking drink! You won't be selling your soul or anything. Trust me, I'd know."_

_Charlie rolled her eyes and took the drink. "There's a difference between being self-righteous and just generally hating you."_

"_That would play a role in this situation if you did hate me," Pete replied, amusement coloring his tone. "And let's be honest, Charlie. You don't hate me. You might want to, but you don't."_

"_How exactly do you figure that?" she demanded._

"_Well, I'm here aren't I?" he said, shooting her one of those insufferable smirks. He took a long sip from his drink and waggled his eyebrows at her theatrically. "Admit it. On some level you enjoy my company."_

"_I don't enjoy your company."_

"_It's your subconscious," shot back, sounding oddly chipper. "You're the one keeping me around."_

_Charlie ground her teeth together and rolled her eyes. "Not by choice," she muttered. "Some annoying little part of you latched on during that Vulcan mind meld. Like a barnacle. Or a planters wart. I would rather be getting root canal right now."_

"_Oh, come on," Peter whined. "We have good conversations. Now what should we talk about next..." He let the sentence fade off for dramatic effect, making Charlie groan internally. This was so not how this dream was supposed to be going. She was supposed to soak up the sun, walk along the beach, maybe swim a little. It was a dream that should help her relax. But even from the grave that son of a bitch had to go and screw everything up. Shit. Being asleep was just as exhausting as being awake. _

_Peter shifted so that he was staring directly at her and readjusted his sunglasses so that he was staring at her over the rim. "What's going on with you and Stiles?"_

_Of course. Of course he would go straight to that. Charlie let out a small, controlled shriek before rounding on Peter. "Ugh! Are you serious? Are you actually serious right now?"_

"_What?" Peter muttered, shrugging his shoulders. "I'm invested."_

_Charlie's mouth dropped open and she stared at him with an expression of disbelief. "Excuse me?"_

"_You know personally," he said, pointing at himself, "I think the two of you would be great together. I mean Lydia is great, don't get me wrong, but I honestly don't understand his preoccupation with her. The two of you would be adorable together. But you gotta open yourself up a bit more, you know? Create your own possibilities."_

_Charlie made a face at him and shook her head. "Your mouth keeps making these strange sounds. You might want to see to that."_

"_You can deflect all you want, Charlie," he sighed. "It doesn't make it any less true. You should really take a long, hard look on how you approach your life."_

"_You're a guy in his thirties who's stuck in the brain of a teenage girl," Charlie drawled out. "Am I really the one who needs to be thinking about their life choices? I think it's time for you to shut up now."_

_And to her surprise, he actually did. The two of them stared out across the ocean and it was finally quiet except for the crashing waves. Still, though, Charlie didn't feel that sense of relaxation. She was just as tense as ever. The whole situation was so, undeniably wrong. Dreams were where you were supposed to decompress, where you were able to subconsciously sort through your issues so they didn't end bleeding into the waking hours. She didn't even have that luxury anymore. Asleep or awake, it was always just more of the same. Something in her had cracked that night at the Hale house, and as time ticked on she could feel that crack widening. And she blamed pretty much all of it on the asshole sitting next to her. The asshole who wouldn't shut the hell up._

_Peter let out a huff and took off his sunglasses entirely, fixing her with a serious stare. "Are you sure about that? I have a vast well of knowledge ready to be used. I am a resource, Charlie. It would be pretty small-minded of you to write me off entirely. I have many insights to share."_

"_Well that's super-duper, Peter!" Charlie exclaimed with sarcastic levity, shooting him two thumbs up. "I'm totally going to start trusting you now that you're possessing my dreams!"_

_Peter's face adopted a more pinched expression. He actually seemed to be getting a little bit irritated with her. "You're not listening to me," he said, enunciating the words carefully. "It's not me you have to worry about any more. I'm dead. Derek is the one you should be keeping an eye on. He and I have more in common than you might think."_

_Typical. She should have expected something like this was coming. That's all Peter was really—redirection, a charming smokescreen. Nothing but hair gel, a dazzling smile, and a ton of lies. Well she wasn't buying into it. Not anymore. "Really?" she drawled out, glowering at him. "What exactly to you have in common with Derek?"_

_Again, Peter let out a disappointed sigh. "Oh, come on, Charlie. You really don't know? You should understand better than most."_

"_Let's assume that I don't and move on from there."_

"_Ugh," he groaned, staring up at the cloudless sky with an expression that clearly read 'why me?' and shaking his head. "Why do other people have to be so dense? Derek's an orphan. You're an orphan, more or less. What do you want?"_

"_Right now some peace and quiet would be high on the list."_

_He let his head roll to the side so he was glaring at her. "Don't be tiresome, Charlie. Reach down deep into that broken little soul of yours and admit to yourself what you want. More than anything. You know what it is—you just have to say the words."_

_All of the sudden the soothing crash of the waves sounded like they were mocking her. She definitely wasn't calm anymore. How did he always do it? How did he always know exactly what buttons to push? He was a good con man, but that wasn't the only reason. It was because, as mush as she hated to admit it, she and Peter actually did have a few things in common. Her jaw twitched in frustration as he raised his eyebrows at her expectantly. "Family," she murmured finally. "People you belong to and who belong to you too."_

_A wide grin split across Peter's face. "Exactly," he said, poking her in the shoulder. "And what else does that sound like to you? What would be another word for that—a synonym if you will."_

_Ah. So that's where he was going with this, taking her by the hand and asking leading questions till she got to the answer he wanted her to settle on. It was a clever strategy, really. This way he could make her think she had arrived at a conclusion herself, and it made her a lot more likely to take him at his word. Well her eyes were open. And she would play along. For now. "A pack," she replied. "You think Derek's going to give people the bite? To build himself a pack?"_

_Peter jerked his head noncommittally. "It's what I did."_

_Charlie let out a frustrated sigh and then covered her face with her hands. "Yeah, but like I said before, Derek isn't you. Do you really think that's something he would do?"_

"_I'm not actually real, remember," Peter said with a serene smile. "Which means that you—" he pointed at her "—you, Charlie Oswin, are the one who's thinking it."_

_Charlie's head snapped back up to look at Peter, but he had vanished into thin air. She was alone now, just her and the waves. It was exactly what she had wanted not moments before, but she didn't feel free like she thought she would. No, she felt more caged in than ever. And the sun on her face didn't give her any warmth anymore. Now she just felt cold._

_That bastard really knew how to get in the last word._

**Reference:**

**-The phrase 'That sentence has too many syllables! Apologize!' is a reference to a videogame called 'Borderlands'**

**Chapter 5 Soundtrack**

Stiles and Charlie play video games and trade insults.

-~-~-~-~-Lies – Is Tropical

A serious conversation followed by some sexual tension.

-~-~-~-~-~Platoon - Jungle

Charlie drives home and studies into the late hours of the night.

-~-~-~-~-Alarm – Wise Blood

Dream!Peter leaves Charlie with a lot to think about. End chapter.

-~-~-~-~-Devil Do – Holly Golightly*****Please listen to this one (the acoustic version). It's got an old school vibe to it and I just really think it's a great way to end a Peter-Charlie snarkfest. The song itself is kind of snarky. I'm probably going over the top with this, but I just really like the image of a pissed off Charlie sitting in a beach chair and fuming over Peter while this song plays.


	6. The Wrench in the Works

**Disclaimer: 'Teen Wolf' isn't mine. Shocking, right? But it's true. If there are any similarities in content or dialogue, it has probably originated with the show.**

**Gaa! Sorry this took so long. Other than the usual work stuff and family drama, I had to cope with other certain…developments. I'm not going to put up any spoilers or anything, but let's just say I'm still reeling. Holy crap.**

**A huge thank you to nessafly, AspiredWriterr, ParalyzedInHeaven, katiesgotagun, Tania, hellohaha, WhatsGoingOn, Chicago4EVERS, TheMMMG, Daenerys86, bagginsoftheshire666, easythrowaway, Vcarp1993, Gee Brittany, Bookiee, Roxu, Devon Laurel, Undeniable Weirdness, zvc56, BrightEyes20, twSOS12345, Emmalee Adams, swanqueen4, imrid-amrad-ursul, Guest, Female whovian, SK-Scatenato, meels234, Guest, Aoibhinn, HQ16, Shes-The-Proto-Type, X23 Maximoff, fearless-dixon, Ayine, xxanniexx, CoffeeShopWriter, Guest, The City of Books, artificial-paradises, and onethousandmoths for the reviews! I love you guys so much. And a special thank you to raggedyponds for the new banner! It was insanely awesome! I love the photo-overlay, the red coloration used, and pretty much everything about it! Thank you! Also, a big thank you to BrittWitt16 for all of her stories. She has an awesome OC fic for the movie 'The Internship' that you should check out! It features none other than the lovely Dylan O'Brien!**

Chapter 6 – The Wrench in the Works

Charlie supposed that her situation could be considered ironic. She had been avoiding sleep for so long because she knew what was coming next. The thought of her bed gave her feelings of anxiety. Each dream she had was a reminder that there was something wrong with her. But as soon as she woke up in the morning, she didn't want to get up. Maybe it was because her brain was never really off, like having Peter in there as well was draining additional energy while she was asleep. Whatever the reason, when Charlie's alarm started blaring in the morning, the light peeking in through her curtains stung her eyes and made them ache. And that was after she hit the snooze button at least six times. Waking her up earlier than that? It was inhumane.

When the sound of 'Girls Just Wanna Have Fun' started blaring out of her phone, Charlie was filled with the sudden, all-consuming urge to find a time machine so she could hunt down and kill Cyndi Lauper before she wrote the song and thereby wiping it from existence. Though it was entirely possible that she was overreacting. Letting out a low, whining groan Charlie managed to reach one hand out of the tangle of covers and grappled around for her phone, knocking her water glass onto the carpeted floor in the process. Finally, her fingers found their way around that evil little piece of plastic. She almost threw it across her room when she saw that the time read 6:13 am. But then it would just start ringing again, and not only would she still be awake, she would have to get out of her bed too. That would be unacceptable. So instead she pressed the 'send' button and held it up to her ear.

"You just made a kid with leukemia very, very happy," she growled into the receiver, her voice lower and scratchier than usual from having just woken up.

"Well that was incredibly noble of me," Lydia drawled out from the other side of the phone. "How did I do that exactly?"

"Because when I sneak into your house and shave your head in the middle of the night, I'm going to be donating it to Locks of Love," Charlie replied matter-of-factly. "There are going to be little gingers running around and they'll all be so adorable. I mean just picture that. You did that. Aren't you proud?"

"Okay, one," Lydia chirped in an exasperated tone, "I can't be proud of something I haven't done yet. And two, I have no idea what the hell you're talking about."

Huffing loudly, Charlie shimmied up in the bed so she was sitting and leaning against the headboard behind her. "Lydia, what's my one rule."

A loud sigh echoed into the receiver. "I don't know, Charlie," she huffed. "You've got about six hundred and thirty-two 'one rules' and honestly I don't care enough to remember all of them."

"Correction," Charlie continued, unfazed by the borderline hostility, "I have exactly three one rules."

"Then why don't you call them your three rules?" Lydia sighed. "Seeing as there are three of them, it kind of makes more sense."

"Because it doesn't sound nearly as dramatic," Charlie quipped back. "One rule 'a' is that you don't mess with my Converse or I will remove the heels from every single pair of Jimmy Choos you own. My one rule 'b' is that you can't wake me up before 7:00 a.m. or I will sneak into your room at night and shave your head. And finally my one rule 'c' is that if we ever decide to take a road trip to Mexico we're going to have to cross the border somewhere other than El Paso, Texas."

"Really?" Lydia demanded, her voice caught between amusement, disbelief, and disdain. "And why exactly is that?"

"Reasons," Charlie muttered vaguely. "Irrelevant reasons. Anyways, I would like to refer you to my one rule 'b'. Last I checked 6:12 was before 7:00. I hope you've got some camo and fatigues in your closet, because you're about to become G.I. Jane."

Charlie could practically hear the eye roll from the other end of the line. "Can we just get to the reason I called, please?"

Charlie gave a quiet harrumph and began plucking absently at the deep purple covers. "By all means. Why are you depriving me of sleep?"

"Because you're coming over to my house for breakfast," Lydia chirped. "My mom has agreed to get us scones and coffee before we go to school. She should be here around half past seven, and I expect you to be there."

"Mmph," Charlie mumbled, wiping the sleep out of her eyes. "Then why did you have to call me over an hour early? That seems more than a little bit unnecessary don't you think?"

"Not really," Lydia sighed. "Because you need to have enough time to get yourself ready for school. You really can't expect me to dress you every day."

"You don't dress me every day."

"I know," Lydia trilled. "And the school landscape suffers because of that. Which is why I'm making absolutely certain that you have enough time to pick out something that doesn't make me want to gouge out my own eyes."

For once Charlie fell silent. She pulled the phone away from her ear and glared at it for a few moments, even going so far as to stick her tongue out at it before putting it back in place. "I should have left you in that forest," she muttered with bitter sarcasm.

"Funny," Lydia replied quickly. "I was just about to say the same thing about you. Your hair would be so much more appropriate in that setting. So would your shoes for that matter."

There was short pause on the other side of the phone. But then that short silence stretched into a longer one, and Charlie couldn't help but begin to feel anxious. The gears of her sleep-addled began to turn and put two and two together. But those mental processes were interrupted again when Lydia spoke. Only this time it didn't have that characteristic confidence. It was high-pitched and slightly shaky. "Look, Charlie, are you coming over or not?"

Blinking the remaining sleep out of her eyes, Charlie straightened up in her seat. "Of—of course I'm coming over," Charlie said immediately. "You know I'm coming over. But I get at least five minutes of loud, obnoxious whining before I do."

There was another pause, and a twisting feeling of panic began to build in the pit of her stomach. She could almost swear she could hear the sound of the clock ticking on the other side of her room. But when Lydia spoke, her voice had once more found that typical prim swagger. "Yeah, I'm not going to be listening to that. Be here at 7:30."

And without so much as a 'goodbye' or 'see you later', Lydia hung up the phone, leaving Charlie with nothing but a dial tone to keep her company. Turning the phone off, she slammed it to her forehead in a 'technological facepalm' before chucking it on the bedside table. With one last reluctant groan, she threw back the covers and clambered out of bed. After picking her fallen water glass up off the floor, she dragged her feet to the shower and cranked up the hot water till steam began to fill the room. She drew a smiley face on the fogged up mirror and climbed under the cascading droplets. She wasn't sure why, but every night after Peter invaded her dreams she felt like she had to wash herself clean. But she could never fully scrub away that worry and anxiety. Especially not today.

Charlie should have noticed that there was something off from the beginning of that phone call, but the lack of sleep had dulled her powers of perception. On the exterior it had all the typical hallmarks of a Lydia Martin power play—that abrupt call, establishing her dominance in the conversation, handing out orders and expecting you to take them happily like they were candy on Halloween. Reflecting back on the conversation, though, she should have noticed all those little things that didn't fit.

First there was the fact that Lydia invited Charlie over to _her_ house. That was weird. Usually the only warning Charlie got before one of these before school hangouts was the ringing of a doorbell. Never in her life had Charlie been to Lydia's house before 10:00 am. Something was different. Which meant that something was wrong. Lydia was bringing things to her territory, to where she felt comfortable. The normal state of things was her making other people feel uncomfortable when they were on their own territory. And Lydia _never_ passed up on an opportunity to dress Charlie up. Ever.

Charlie sat in her bed for a few more moments. She let out a loud sigh and ran her hands through her tangled hair. What just happened on the phone—that slight waver in the voice and the hint of uncertainty—that was the sound of Lydia freaking out. Without another moment's hesitation, Charlie threw back the covers and clambered out of bed. Ignoring the dull ache behind her eyes crying out for sleep, she darted around, getting ready for class. Shower, brush the teeth, comb the hair—all of the appropriate boxes on the checklist were marked off. Hell, she even did as she was asked and paid special attention to her outfit. It gave her a migraine to think about clothes that much, but eventually she settled on an embellished black shirt tucked into a pair of golden-colored denim shorts, a cropped black leather jacket, some knee-high knitted, patterned black socks, and a pair of top-sider boots. Charlie stepped back and took a long look in the mirror. She was actually pretty sure Lydia would like it. Which was why she left her hair so messy. Lydia wouldn't be happy unless there was at least one thing to criticize.

When she had finished getting out her dressed, Charlie took a few moments to look at her own reflection in the mirror. Despite the polished outfit, she still looked a little frayed. Each day the bags under her eyes seemed to get just a bigger. Or maybe that was her imagination. Nobody else really seemed to notice it. Maybe it was all in her head, just like everything else these days. Swearing under her breath, Charlie went back to the bathroom and grabbed the cover-up out of one of the drawers of the vanity, dabbing on a few extra layers to blot out the exhaustion. Out of sight, out of mind.

After shoving her school books in her messenger bag, Charlie set out across the street, unsure of what she was going to find on the other side. She rang the doorbell and blew out a long breath, bouncing up and down on the balls of her feet as she waited for someone to open the door. The seconds began to drag on and she could swear she could hear a ticking noise. Suddenly, the door was wrenched open, revealing not Lydia but Mrs. Martin on the other side. The second she saw Charlie the woman's face filled with a gratitude that Charlie frankly didn't really recognize.

"Charlie!" she sighed, leaning against the door a little more heavily than she probably needed to. "It was so nice of you to come on such short notice."

Charlie blinked in surprise and confusion at the abruptness of the greeting, but quickly recovered. "Y—yeah," she said with a nod. "Of course. Thanks for the breakfast."

"Oh, it was no trouble at all." Mrs. Martin smiled and stepped out of the doorway, opening it even wider so she could allow Charlie through. Charlie nodded at the woman and stepped over the threshold. She glanced around the house, a sense of apprehension filling her. She felt like something was supposed to be different now. With all the things that had happened, something must have changed. But it was exactly the same. The same aggressive neatness, the same pictures hanging, the same everything. Except for the people inside. Death—or almost dying—had a way of doing that to people.

Mrs. Martin appeared at Charlie's shoulder again, making the girl jump slightly. "She's in her room," the woman said, nodding in the direction of the staircase. "She's picking out something to wear for to school today. I told her she could stay home, but she seemed pretty insistent on it."

"Yeah," Charlie said with what was almost a laugh. "Lydia is determined when it comes to pretty much every decision she makes. Except clothes."

"Except clothes," Mrs. Martin agreed. She looked up the stairway with a concerned expression before turning back to Charlie. "I'm going to go get the two of you breakfast now," she murmured absently. "Do you think you could make sure she's okay while I'm away?"

"Yeah," Charlie said, nodding earnestly. "Yeah, of course."

"Thank you," Mrs. Martin said with a relieved smile, placing a grateful hand on Charlie's arm. "I'll call the both of you down when I have breakfast set up."

With a nod of thanks, Charlie ran up the stairs, but that twisting sensation of anxiety in the pit of her stomach flared up again. Of course Mrs. Martin was still concerned for her daughter—it made sense that she was still worried—but right now it just confirmed for Charlie that her friend was not okay. And Charlie really needed Lydia to be okay. The closer she got to the room, the slower she moved, worried about what she might find on the other side. Lydia was strong—she knew that—but she was also unpredictable. There was no way of being sure what would be on the other side of the door. As she closed in, Charlie lifted her hand and knocked gently.

"Come in!" Lydia's voice proclaimed loudly.

The next few moments seemed to happen in slow motion, like the lead-up to the big reveal in a horror movie. Charlie slowly reached down for the doorknob and turned it, gently pushing it open. The door swung open to reveal the contents inside. Her mouth fell open at the sight of what was probably the neatest version of chaos she had ever seen. Virtually every surface in the room was covered in clothes, but not in the way Charlie's room was with pairs of jeans flung over chairs or on a pile next to her bed. No, these clothes were arranged carefully, almost reverently. The door squeaked loudly as it swung open, making Lydia look up at her. Charlie wasn't sure if 'rolling your eyes in relief' was a thing before, but it definitely was now.

"Charlie—thank God!" Lydia sighed out. She turned towards her friend, holding up a dress in each hand. "I'm probably going to regret asking you this, but which one do you think makes the better 'post near death experience' ensemble?" She lifted one and then the other, weighing her options.

Charlie just stood there stupidly for a few moments. It was like her brain was on a delay. "You're—you're asking me for advice on clothes? Clothes that you intend on wearing? Today?"

"Yeah..." Lydia drawled out, looking at Charlie like she was a little bit of an idiot. "I'm surprised by it too. Now can you make your mouth start talking about things that are relevant, please?"

Charlie shook off the surprise and looked at the two options. One of them was an elegant but casual little black number that would look really good on her. Unfortunately, it would also reinforce the fact that Lydia's skin was still paler than usual. On the other hand, literally, there was a magenta form-fitting dress. It would bring out the little color in the girl's cheeks and the bold color would project confidence. Not something that Lydia usually needed any help with, but on a day like this one it couldn't hurt. "That one," she said, gesturing at the magenta dress.

Pursing her lips, Lydia turned to her floor-length mirror. She tossed the black dress to the side and held the magenta one's hanger up at her neck, pressing the fabric against her form and swaying side to side a bit. "Hm," she murmured, narrowing her eyes at her own reflection. "I never thought we'd see the day, Charlie, but I actually agree with you." She turned to Charlie and let her eyes rake up and down the other girl's form, a critical look in her eyes. "And by some miracle I approve of what you're wearing. We're making progress." But then Lydia's eyes lingered on Charlie's hair. "Except for your hair," she continued. "It looks like you got into a fight with a bird. And Charlie? The bird won."

Blowing out a long breath, Charlie carefully moved aside one of the piles of clothes on the bed making enough room for her to sit down. "So what's with all this?" she asked, waving her hand around the room. "It's kind of a lot of effort for today. I mean everything you own is nice. You could pick pretty much anything."

At that, Lydia's eyes fell shut and her jaw twitched violently, like she was trying to repress an insane amount of frustration. "Ugh," she sighed, shaking her head at Charlie. "I swear to God you never listen to me! What did I tell you! School is a battlefield. You have to take every opportunity you have to make yourself the winner!"

"Okay..." Charlie drawled out, nodding without knowing exactly what the hell it was she was talking about. "But what are we winning exactly?"

A pitying look crossed Lydia's face as she stepped towards the girl. "Oh dear sweet Charlie," she murmured, patting Charlie's cheek in the most condescending way possible. "If you still have to ask, you'll never know."

Charlie wrinkled her nose at Lydia, giving her a weird look. "Do you have some popularity manifesto hidden away somewhere? And if the answer is yes is it a Word document saved on your laptop or did you have it made into a leather-bound book that you keep hidden under your mattress."

Lydia smirked a bit, peeking at Charlie from under her eyelashes. "How did you know about that?" she demanded with false innocence. Charlie let out a loud groan and collapsed backwards on the piles of clothes behind her, only to receive a definitive smack over the head. "Stop wrinkling my clothes," Lydia growled, prodding Charlie with her finger until the girl was back in the sitting position.

Charlie huffed loudly, blowing some stray hairs out of her face, and looked up at Lydia. The girl was gnawing on her lip in a way that was entirely uncharacteristic. "Lydia, you don't have to do this," Charlie said quietly. "Not yet anyway. You were mauled by a wild animal like five days ago. Nobody's going to blame you for taking a couple more days off."

"Ugh," Lydia drawled with yet another roll of her eyes. "You sound just like my mother."

"Maybe your mother's right," Charlie suggested.

"It's already decided," Lydia said, waving her hand dismissively. She disappeared into her bathroom for a few moments and when she reappeared again, the plushy robe was gone and she was wearing what looked to be a fairly constricting dress. She made a beeline for the mirror and began smoothing the fabric down against her skin, doing a little twirl and inspecting her appearance. She gave herself a nod of approval and grabbed the mascara from her makeup kit. "So what's going on with you and Allison?" she asked in that casual tone she had that was anything but casual.

Charlie's mouth dropped open and she froze for a second, her ability to speak completely evaporating. "Uh—wh—what are you talking about exactly?" Charlie asked. She cleared her throat awkwardly and scratched at the back her neck, making Lydia smirk.

"Oh, come on, Charlie," she said with a roll of the eyes. "It's so obvious. I haven't seen the two of you in the same room since the dance—you haven't visited me together. Plus when I mention you to Allison she gets that weird, furrowed-eyebrow, constipated look she gets when something's bothering her. When I mention her to you, you just look super-guilty." She stopped applying the mascara long enough to shoot Charlie a loaded, suspicious glance. "So what happened?" she pressed. "Did you make out with McCall too?"

Any sensations of guilt immediately changed to something nearing 'disgust'. Or at the very least 'perturbed'. At the suggestion, Charlie gagged slightly and stuck out her tongue. "What? Ugh, no! Gross! Why would you even think that?"

"Because the only time Allison's ever gotten pissed at me was after that little episode," Lydia said casually, returning to her mascara. "I figured it had to be something like that."

"Well, it wasn't," Charlie said, still frowning at the thought and shuddering visibly. "And now I feel like I have to brush my teeth. Or wash my mouth out with acid. Or both."

"Always so dramatic," Lydia clucked. She grabbed her lip gloss out of her purse and began to apply it in front of the mirror. She rubbed them together to spread the gloss and smacked them loudly before turning back to Charlie. "You're not going to tell me what happened?"

"No, I'm not," Charlie said. It was the honest answer. Because anything else she said was going to be a lie. And frankly she didn't have the brain power to come up with a lie that was plausible at this point.

A disappointed but unsurprised expression crossed Lydia's face. She wrinkled her nose slightly and sighed loudly. "Fine," she chirped loudly. "Fine. Neither of you want to contribute or play along? I guess I'll have to take care of it all myself."

"Take care of what?" Charlie asked, furrowing her eyebrows in confusion.

"This whole ridiculous fight thing," Lydia replied primly. "It just...it's not going to work for me. Scheduling you both in at different times is so completely beyond ridiculous. I really don't give a crap what's going on, but I'm going to fix it."

"Really?" Charlie snorted. "How exactly do you think you're going to fix it?"

Lydia applied a little more lipstick and smacked them together with a resounding 'pop'. "Well for a start I told Allison to meet us at the front of the school so we could get a little bit of a chat in before class," she smirked.

Charlie let out a disbelieving snort and pinched the bridge of her nose in frustration. "Allison agreed to that?"

Lydia gave a prim shrug and jerked her head to the side noncommittally. "I may or may not have left out the 'you' part of 'us'," she replied easily.

A feeling of cold dread swooped through the pit of Charlie's stomach. Hell, it wasn't just that generalized feeling of regret. She actually felt straight-up nauseous. Charlie wasn't used to orchestrating reconciliations for the same reason she wasn't used to getting into fights. She had no reason to in the first place. Letting out a quiet groan, she rubbed at her forehead. A hand descended from somewhere above her and clapped a comforting hand on her shoulder. Charlie raised her head, glaring at the perpetually smug Lydia. "I'm the one who's supposed to be making you feel better, remember?" she growled.

"Since when have I played by your little rules?"

Charlie collapsed back on top of the piles of Lydia's clothes for a second time, this time ignoring the orders to 'get her adorable, lazy ass up'. But she just stayed lying down, closed her eyes, and whined about needing more sleep after the unceremonious wakeup call. Huffing in frustration, Lydia grabbed one of the numerous articles of clothing lying around and chucked it at Charlie's head, making it land squarely on her eyes. Sighing happily, Charlie placed her hands behind her head as a makeshift pillow. "You realize that you just helped me out, right?" she yawned loudly. "You've blocked out all the light and now I can go back to sleep."

That self-satisfied feeling only lasted a few more seconds, though, because all of the sudden something very solid collided with her stomach. Charlie let out a sad little 'oomph' noise and squeaked in surprise. "There," Lydia's voice proclaimed, sounding highly satisfied with herself. "Is that helping too?"

After letting out a loud groan, Charlie yanked what turned out to be one of Lydia's dresses from her face and sat up, finding a high-heeled stiletto sitting on the bed next to her. "Seriously?" she demanded, chucking the shoe back in Lydia's direction. "You could have killed me with that thing! The heel qualifies as a deadly weapon!"

"Stop whining," Lydia sighed, applying the last little bit of makeup. She stepped back from the mirror and did a bit of a twirl, before smiling happily. "And that, my dear Charlie, is how you make an entrance."

"Not my style," Charlie replied with a shrug, staring absently at the ceiling. "I prefer explosions going on in the background while walking away. Cool people don't look at explosions. Just ask Andy Samberg."

"Okay, what the hell are you talking about?" Lydia demanded, throwing her hands in the air.

"'Cool Guys Don't Look At Explosions'?" Charlie elaborated, pushing herself back up on her elbows. "The SNL skit? The Lonely Island?" Lydia simply stared back with a non-plussed expression. Letting out a groan, Charlie collapsed back on the bed. "Seriously? I don't know why I even bother with you people."

The only response she got was another solid object colliding with her stomach. "Ugh, seriously?"

Sitting up in the bed, Charlie chucked the shoes back in Lydia's general direction and the clattered to the ground a few feet away from the girl. Lydia wasn't fazed at all. She didn't even flinch while she was fixing her hair. Cool, calm, collected, unflappable Lydia. Almost icy Lydia. She always had that hard shell of an exterior, making it virtually impossible for you to see what was actually going on underneath. Usually Charlie was okay with that—it wasn't like she was a prime example of transparency herself—but now it was almost infuriating. Mostly because that shell was cracking a little bit. It wasn't much—not enough for most people to notice—but Charlie did. It was just enough to give her a hint, but there was no clear picture. Charlie still didn't know what was going on with her friend, and that scared the crap out of her.

Charlie scooted forwards so she was perched on the edge of the bed, balling up the fabric of the comforters in her fists. She gnawed on her lip for a moment before building up the resolve to speak up again. "So..." she drawled out, hesitant to approach the topic. "How are you feeling?"

Lydia shrugged her shoulders primly and fluffed her hair a little more. "Kind of hungry," she muttered, spinning around to face Charlie. "My mom really should have gotten back with the scones by now. She's probably flirting with the barista—he's cute and _almost_ age-appropriate for her."

Pressing her lips together in a thin line, Charlie raised her eyebrows challengingly. "You know that's not what I meant."

"Yeah, Charlie," Lydia drawled. "I know that's not what you meant."

"Then why didn't you answer it?"

"Because I have answered it," she snapped. Her eyes fell shut for a moment and she rubbed at her forehead as she tried to regain her composure. When she finally looked up again, she was wearing a tight-lipped, uncomfortable smile. "Look, Charlie, I've answered it about a thousand times. I've told my mom, I've told my dad, I've told the doctors, and when we get to school I'm going to have to tell Allison when she asks me and plus having to deal with everybody else..." She folded her arms across her chest and stuck out her lower lip in a pout. "Can we just forget about all the crap going on and have 'Lydia and Charlie time'? Please?"

Once again, the icy hand of guilt bitch-slapped Charlie straight across the face. She couldn't even come close to understanding what Lydia was going through right now. It was all so freaking hypocritical. Here she was pumping Lydia for all the information and tiny details she could get. And yes it was because she was worried about her friend—it was more about that than anything else—but it was also so that she could piece together more information with the full moon approaching. Meanwhile Lydia was looking for all sorts of answers. And there Charlie was with all of them, and not saying a damn thing. It was official. She was a terrible person.

Swallowing heavily, Charlie nodded in agreement. "Yeah," she nodded. "Yeah, of course. I mean, did you almost die? I can't even remember that far back."

That crack in Lydia's façade stayed there long enough for her to give a smile of appreciation Charlie didn't deserve before her face readopted that same mildly dissatisfied expression it usually had. "Good," she chirped.

It was a few more minutes before Mrs. Martin got back with the breakfast. The conversation as the sat around the table, munching on scones, was ridiculously normal. Clothes, boys, gossip, classes—all those things that they used to talk about seemed a little silly to talk about now, in the context of everything that was going on. But it was what Lydia needed right now, and if there was one thing Charlie was good at, it was talking.

Before long it was time for them both to go. They made their way to the front, but as they reached the door, Lydia's mother swooped in from nowhere and wrapped Lydia in a huge hug that lasted a lot longer usual. That delay gave Charlie a bit of a head start, letting her run across the street and clamber into her car. And for the first time, Charlie managed to beat Lydia to school. So she got to be the one leaning against the car, arms crossed, staring expectantly over her sunglasses as she waited for the other to arrive. Lydia only arrived a few minutes after Charlie, but Charlie made sure it looked like she had been waiting for hours. Lydia's Beetle pulled into the parking lot a few spots from over her eyes. Apparently she had already caught sight of Charlie as she rolled in, because as she climbed out of the car, she was already rolling her eyes.

"What the hell took you so long?" Charlie demanded, smirking slightly.

Lydia gave her a withering look as she came to a stop in front of Charlie, raising her eyebrows. "Don't look so smug, Charlie," she said with a sinister sort of sweetness. "You're going to get premature wrinkles around your mouth." She extended a single finger, lifting it to Charlie's face so she could push the sunglasses back up the bridge of her nose. She took a step back and folded her arms across herself, looking supremely pleased with herself. "And anyways, you're the one stuck waiting for me in the school parking lot like a lost puppy. You might as well be holding a boom box over your head as you stare longingly, waiting for my approach."

"Nah..." Charlie drawled out, wrinkling her nose slightly at the thought. "Boom boxes are way too heavy. My arms would get tired."

But it didn't look like Lydia was paying any attention to Charlie. Her eyes had slid past to something over Charlie's shoulder. Charlie herself turned around and followed her friends gaze until her eyes fell on Allison who was standing near the entrance and looked like she was searching for someone. Lydia threw a hand in the air and waved enthusiastically. "And there's my other lost puppy."

Allison caught sight of Lydia and returned the wave, but seemed to falter a bit when she saw Charlie standing there was well. Shit. This was going to be uncomfortable wasn't it?

Lydia flashed Charlie a satisfied smile and inclined her head in Allison's direction. "Come on, Charlie. Let's go say hello."

Without another moment's hesitation, Lydia marched forward leaving Charlie feeling a wee bit stranded and alone. Her hand clutched at the strap of her messenger bag, the knuckles turning white as the bone strained against the skin. Yup. This was definitely going to be uncomfortable. Deep breath. Charlie sucked the cold air into her lungs, holding it there for a solid ten seconds before expelling it from her body. Okay. Time to nut up or shut up.

By the time Charlie made to the pair, Allison had thrown her arms around Lydia, pulling the girl into a tight hug. Charlie just stood there next to them, kind of shut out of the interaction. She felt a little bit like an intruder on the whole thing. "Okay, Allison," Lydia's muffled voice said as she weakly patted Allison on the back. "This is nice and all, but I do still have like sixty stitches. So consider me hugged."

The levels of awkward Charlie was feeling increased with each second that ticked by until the hug finally broke. Except then it didn't get any better. Actually, it got worse. Because now she and Allison didn't have a reason to not talk to each other. Allison's eyes flickered to Charlie for about half a second before turning back to Lydia. "You know, I kind of can't believe that you're actually here," she said, raising her eyebrows at the red-head. "This is a whole new level of stubbornness. Even for you."

"Please," Lydia chirped, flipping her hair over her shoulder. "Like you guys could survive more than a day without me."

"So how are you feeling?" Allison asked urgently.

Lydia glanced at Charlie out of the corner of her eye with a look that clearly spelled 'I told you so' before flashing Allison a smile. "Totally fine," she replied easily. "Just—" she shook her head and let out a sigh "—just ready for all the weird crap to be over with." She glanced back and forth between Allison and Charlie, raising her eyebrows expectantly. "Aren't you guys going to say 'hi' to each other?"

Allison's mouth fell open and her eyes widened slightly like she was uncertain what to do, but under Lydia's poignant stare she eventually turned to Charlie. "Uh...um...h—hi," she stammered out, giving a weird wave.

"Hey," Charlie replied, giving one long, slow wave in response.

Lydia's eyes continued to dart back and forth between the other two girls, her eyebrows fixed in the raised position and waiting for something to happen. When nothing did, she let out a loud, slightly contemptuous scoff and rolled her eyes. "Wow, you guys," she muttered. "That was really emotional. I think I might be tearing up a little bit."

When even that didn't elicit a warmer reaction, Lydia sighed and linked one of her arms through Charlie's left one and the other through Allison's right and practically frog-marched them in the direction of the school's main entrance. As they moved, Charlie noticed the eyes of several passersby lingering on them for a while, but she didn't give any indication of it.

"So really," Allison pressed as they made their way to the front doors. "How are you feeling?"

"I never knew people paying so much attention to me could be such a pain in the ass," Lydia groaned. "I'm fine. I'm healing fine. I just remember being in the hospital and then all the sudden I'm standing on the side of the road in the middle of nowhere with Charlie gawking at me with this concussed look on her face."

"You really don't remember anything?" Allison insisted. She spared Charlie a concerned glance, like she was looking for confirmation.

"They called it a fugue state," Lydia grumbled, clearly dissatisfied with the medical services of Beacon Hills. "Which is basically a way of saying 'We have no idea why you can't remember running through the woods naked for two days.'" Then she abruptly unlinked her arms from Allison's and Charlie's spinning around to face them, bringing the group to a stop right before the doors. "But personally, I don't care," she continued with a wide smirk. "I lost nine pounds!"

Charlie let out a long, low whistle and rocked back on her heels. "Nine pounds? Dude, that's even better than Mel's week long juice fast. Well actually it was more like five days. She found me eating a Snickers and started screaming about me being insensitive until I cooked her a steak. She dug into that thing like she was auditioning for the role of 'lion mauling wildebeest' in a Discovery Channel documentary."

A delicate snort emanated from somewhere next to her where Allison was staring intently at her shoes. Lydia clucked disapprovingly and rolled her eyes. "Thank you, Charlie, for that glorious mental image. It's exactly what I wanted to start my day thinking about."

Confidence. It usually seeped out of every single one of Lydia's pores and formed a cloud around her like perfume. Charlie was actually pretty sure it was some sort of neurotoxin or something that lulled people into a hypnotic state, making them predisposed to be in awe of her. But this time there was a little too much of it there. It seemed like it was forced. Charlie forcibly held back her reaction, knowing it would only lead to a frustrated Lydia, but Allison picked up on the difference too. "Are you sure ready for this?" she asked, eyeing Lydia with concern.

"Please," Lydia said with a smirk. "It's not like my aunt's a serial killer."

With that parting shot, Lydia spun on her heels and burst through the door with as much drama as possible. Charlie glanced at Allison out of the corner of her eye. The girl seemed to be shell-shocked, thrown by the casual and glib reference to her aunt. Again Charlie had to force back the question she wanted so badly to ask. 'Are you okay?' But it didn't look like she would get a straight answer out of anybody today. Allison noticed she was being watched and blinked in surprise. She and Charlie made eye contact for about half a second before Allison shook her head, reassembling her thoughts, and strode through the door as well.

Great. That was fan-freaking-tastic. Usually it was just Charlie that was being all cagey and emotionally repressed, but now everybody was. Jesus, was she usually this annoying? She would have to issue a blanket apology to everybody. Especially Stiles. He always seemed to be the one who was on the receiving end of her inability to express human emotion. It kind of made her wonder why he bothered with getting her to open up in the first place.

Taking one deep breath, Charlie strengthened her resolve and strode forwards and shoved her way through the door as well. She didn't get far, though, stopping short and narrowly avoiding a three-car pile-up of her, Allison, and Lydia. Somehow in ten seconds between when Lydia had strode through the door and she had, pretty much the entirety of the student body had come to a stop and were staring at the three of them. Some of them looked curious, some of them looked mildly afraid, and a whole lot of them looked smug. But they all had one thing in common—they looked expectant, like they were waiting for something to happen. For Lydia to rip off all her clothes and run back into the woods for example.

Shit. This was very, very not good. Lydia just stood there, frozen like a deer in headlights. Even from behind her Charlie could see her visibly twitching under the degree of attention. Hell, she was almost trembling. Charlie knew she was probably supposed to do something, but she wasn't quite sure what. It wasn't like there was a manual for this type of situation. Her initial instinct was to yell at them all to fuck off before she cut somebody, but something told her that wouldn't exactly help the situation. The three of them stood there, unsure of what to say or do. That is until Allison to a small step towards Lydia. "Maybe it's the nine pounds," she mused quietly.

Somehow that one dry comment was enough break Lydia out of her little fear-induced trance. Her posture straightened, she jutted her chin out, and she flipped her hair over her shoulder before striding forwards into the crowd, her gait demanding that they move aside and let her through. And they did. A giant grin split across Charlie's face as she watched Lydia go. Sure there might be more trepidation than envy in people's eyes as she brushed past them, but, as per usual, she left a cloud of awesome in her wake. You might knock Lydia Martin down every once in a while, but she was never out of the game.

"Well that was interesting," Charlie murmured, more to herself than anybody else. But just because she was talking to herself didn't mean there wasn't a response.

"You can say that again."

Charlie's head snapped around and she found Allison standing next to her, staring after Lydia with a satisfied smile. She blinked in surprise at the sound of the other girl's voice. Those were pretty much the first words she had voluntarily directed at Charlie in days. Charlie shifted slightly on her feet so that she was facing Allison directly. "Can I?"

The somber look returned to Allison's face and she bit down on her lip. But she didn't leave. She stayed. And that finally gave Charlie the chance to say what she needed to say.

"I'm not going to apologize for lying to you."

The sentence came out a little more bluntly than Charlie intended, but it did have the desired effect. Allison's eyes snapped to Charlie's. She was wearing an expression that was a strange mixture of curiosity and offense. Charlie took a deep breath, steeling her resolve before the words started spilling out of her.

"I'm not going to apologize," she repeated with an ironically apologetic shrug. "I'm not. I mean what was I supposed to say to you? 'Hey, Allison, your boyfriend is acting super-weird because werewolves exist and, by the way, he's one of them.' You didn't even know about werewolves then! And you could have made some off-hand, throwaway comment to your dad or worse, to Kate, and then what would have happened?" She let out a heavy sigh and ran her hands down her face. "I didn't choose them over you, I chose Scott's _life_ over your peace of mind. Yeah. I did that. But I'm not sorry I for the choice I made. It was the right thing to do and I'd do it all over again."

Charlie couldn't translate the expression on Allison's face. Maybe it was pain, maybe it was hurt, but it was definitely too late for Charlie to stop now. "I am sorry for something, though," Charlie continued. "The fact that I had to make a choice in the first place. I am sorry for that. It—it's not like I enjoyed it. I'd see you confused and hurt and...It would make me want to puke, okay? Like full-on, disgusting barf-fest. Then I got used to it. And somehow...somehow that made it even worse. It was like all of the lying physically ate its way into my bones and...and became me. And I hate it. God I hate it." Charlie wrapped her arms around her waist and stared up at the lights above her for a second before lowering her eyes back down to Allison again. "That's it. That's my truth. You can either forgive me or not—that's your call. But, Allison, I really, really hope you do. Because I miss you. And I never miss anyone."

By the time Charlie finished, Allison's eyes were wide and her mouth was open, but no words were coming out. Okay. Charlie knew when it was time to admit defeat. Her shoulders slumped forwards as a wave of disappointment crashed into her. "Alright," she said finally, nodding at Allison. "I'm—I'm just going to go. I guess I'll see you later. Or not. It's up to you."

Charlie moved to follow Lydia into the crowd, but as she turned to ascend those stairs she stopped short, the soles of her shoes squeaking against the laminate tiles as she did so. The backdrop of the school had disappeared, along with the sun and any sense of safety Charlie still had. She was in the dark, surrounded by trees, with dead leaves instead of those crappy tiles under her feet. Oh, crap. It was happening again.

Everything in Charlie's body was screaming at her to run—to run until she was sure she was safe—but she stayed rooted in place, clutching at the strap of her messenger bag. This wasn't real. None of it was real—it couldn't be real. It was all in her head, like the fire and the screams before. It was all a hallucination. She was standing in the doorway to the school, and if she started running, she would probably collide with a set of lockers and break her nose. But it all looked so _real._ And then she saw it. That one set of red eyes, glowing in the dark and slowly circling around her. And it was getting closer. Even though her brain knew it was fake, her heart began to beat faster and her breaths coming out quicker and shallower.

"Charlie?"

The hand on her shoulder made Charlie twitch violently. She blinked and when she opened her eyes again, everything was back to normal again. Charlie let out a long, shaky breath and rubbed at her forehead, trying to get rid of the headache that was threatening to split her skull open.

"Charlie, are you okay? You looked like you were about to pass out or something."

It took a few seconds for Charlie to realize that the echoing voice and the hand on her shoulder both belonged to Allison. Charlie gave a small intake of breath and shrugged away the hand, taking a wobbly step backwards. "Y—yeah," Charlie stammered. She kept blinking over and over, forcing the image she was looking at to normalize. "Yeah, I'm fine. Just a bit of a head rush." Her chest hurt from trying to regulate her breathing. Quick, short breaths—that's what she needed or she was about to spin out. It felt like the room was shrinking, the walls closing in tighter and tighter, about to crush her. She needed out. She needed out right now. Her eyes began darting around frantically, looking for some sort of escape. Luckily enough for her she was still standing right next to a giant set of doors. "I need to get some air."

Without another word Charlie marched to the doors, still feeling a little woozy. She was pretty sure she heard Allison call out after her, but her brain didn't register it until she was already running through the parking lot. And she didn't stop till she was finally alone, almost colliding with the chain-link fence that separated the school from the lacrosse field. She wound her fingers in the cold metal, using it to hold herself up, and rested her forehead against the surface. The links dug into her skin, probably causing a weird pattern of indentations, but she didn't care.

What was the hell was happening to her? What had Peter done to her? Scott had been through the exact same thing she had. It had been traumatizing and immensely painful, but it hadn't been anything like this. He didn't have hallucinations or borderline nervous breakdowns in public places. But then again he wasn't human. He was built to withstand this kind of thing. Her? She was one of the puny humans. She was a bag of brittle bones and flimsy skin. All the snarkiness and witty comebacks in the world weren't going to protect her. There was no way of telling what this was going to do to her.

The knotted scars where he had shoved his claws into the back of her neck were tingling like an electrical shock that was just on the wrong side of painful. The sudden wave of adrenaline was slowly fading away and letting her breathe properly, but the hand of panic was still clutching her throat. And those memories still existed in her head. Her stomach clenched when she realized what she had been looking at in that forest. It was the night Laura Hale had been killed. Only it wasn't Laura Hale standing there. It was her. She was the one in the dark, waiting to be killed.

Panic, fear, frustration, anger—all those things that came with uncertainty bore down on her all at once. Her fingers tightened around the links until the metal began to cut into her fingers. And then she shook it. Hard. "Damn it!" She ground her teeth together and shook it again. "Damn it! Damn it! Damn it! Damn it!"

The shaking of the fence soon turned into the kicking of the chain link fence. It was pathological, and maybe a little bit crazy, but she needed this. All of those conflicting emotions building up inside her and those secrets she couldn't bring herself to talk about—she needed an outlet for that. And for some inexplicable reason, abusing the chain-link fence seemed like the way to go. Eventually her arms began to ache and again she was left clinging to the thing, taking deep breaths. She actually felt better. That is, until someone cleared their throat behind her.

Charlie whipped around, her eyes wide with surprise, and found herself staring at none other than Isaac Lahey. He was fully dressed in his lacrosse gear, a gigantic number 14 spelled across his chest, and he was holding his helmet under his arm. "H—hey, Isaac," she stammered uncomfortably. She lifted her hand to wave awkwardly at him but the thought better of it and lowered it back down. "What, uh, what are you doing here? Shouldn't you be at lacrosse practice right now?"

"Um, yeah," Isaac replied. "I was." He lifted his helmet in the air to show her as some sort of evidence. "I just—I heard you and came to see what was going on."

"You heard me?" Charlie demanded, furrowing her eyebrows in confusion. "All the way from the lacrosse field?"

"I have—" Isaac pointed at his ear "—I have really good hearing."

"Apparently."

The two of them stood there staring at each other for a few moments. It was a bizarre sort of standoff. Each of them was waiting for the other to say something, but neither of them had any idea of what to say. Then Isaac's eyes slid past Charlie to the chain-link fence and she was left feeling incredibly flustered. She glanced at the fence over her shoulder and let out an awkward laugh. "R—right," she said, jerking her thumb in the direction of the fence. "That. That was me...I've just been having a really long day."

"School hasn't even started yet," Isaac shot back.

"Exactly," Charlie nodded. "So it's going to be getting even longer."

Isaac gave her a soft, oddly confident smile and nodded in understanding. "Hey, I get it," he murmured, gesturing to himself. "The fence probably had it coming. I mean, I know I've never liked it myself. Except I usually think about scaling it and getting the hell out of here. Or bursting straight through it like the Kool-Aid man. But this...this works too."

Charlie grimaced and collapsed back against said fence, rubbing at her forehead. "That was a pretty weird thing to walk in on, wasn't it?"

Isaac made a face and shook his head in an entirely unconvincing way. "Nah, I'm sure you were doing something totally normal. Like performance art."

"Since when is performance art normal?" Charlie scoffed.

He opened his mouth to say something, but then his eyebrows drew together in confusion. "Good point." He lapsed into silence and scratched absently at the back of his neck. "So I hear you found Lydia," he said suddenly. "Congratulations. Uh, I mean I'm glad to hear that you did. I know you were really worried about her. And she's okay, so that's good. Right?"

"Yeah," Charlie said. The words came out a little too loud and a little too quick, making Isaac give her a suspicious look. "Yeah, no, she's fine. It's such a relief to have her back."

Isaac narrowed his eyes at her. "But you don't exactly look relieved, do you? You're still worried about her."

He wasn't asking a question, he was making a statement of fact. And for some reason it made Charlie feel slightly uncomfortable. "I'll always be worried about Lydia," she muttered. "No matter how much she says she's fine, I'll still worry about her anyway. It's just...how the friendship thing goes I guess."

"And how are you doing?" Isaac asked.

"I wasn't the one who was mauled by a wild animal," she replied. "Everything's peaches and gravy over here. I'm totally fine."

"And is there anyone worrying about you anyway?" he returned, an inscrutable expression on his face.

Charlie frowned at him. That was a strange question to ask. Isaac never really said the thing you would outright expect him to say, he was a strange combination of shy and incredibly blunt, but this was a step further than usual. Hell, everything about this interaction was weird. She didn't pretend to know Isaac all that well—hell, they had officially met less than a week ago—but he had always been someone who was scared of his own shadow. If someone moved to quickly or surprised him, he flinched. She didn't see much of that right now.

"Nobody needs to be," she said, eyeing him warily.

"You sure about that?" he said, nodding at the fence she had spent the last few moments beating up. He took a few steps towards her, and Charlie felt her heart rate speed up a little bit. He looked genuinely concerned, but the way he was acting made her nervous. "Look," he said as he came to a stop in front of her. "The other day you told me to come and find you if I ever needed to talk. I wanted to let you know it's a two-way street. If you need to talk to someone, I'm here. I'm a surprisingly insightful person."

Charlie bit down on the inside of her cheek and nodded at him, again feeling oddly suspicious. "Thanks, Isaac," she murmured, her voice a little higher pitched than usual. "I appreciate that."

The smile that covered his face next seemed genuine enough, but Charlie still didn't trust it. "My pleasure. Anything to keep you from getting arrested for vandalism of school property. I'd be pretty bummed if you were expelled."

There was something wrong here. There was something that just didn't fit. Looking at Isaac was like looking at one of the puzzles in the Highlights magazines they kept in doctors' offices for the kids. They would have these two pictures next to each other with a certain amount of differences for you to find. And right now she felt like she was staring at two Isaacs—the one from today and the one from a few days ago—and trying to pick out the differences. Then she found one. And it was one that freaked that hell out of her. Because as soon as she noticed it, everything else seemed to slide into place. Her conversation with Peter, the twisting feeling in the pit of her stomach, that thing that seemed out of place with Isaac, him hearing her all the way from the lacrosse field—all of it made sense. If she was right. But of course she was right.

"What happened to your black eye?"

At that point Isaac took a step back, frowning in confusion. "What, uh, what do you mean?"

This time it was Charlie's turn to take a step towards him, but it wasn't comforting out even menacing. It was accusing. "Your black eye," she repeated. "It's gone. What happened?"

Isaac let out an uncomfortable laugh and scratched at the back of his neck. "Um, what usually happens to black eyes," he explained. "It healed."

"That quickly?"

"I—I'm a fast healer," he stammered back. "And anyways I told you it wasn't that bad. Why does this matter exactly?"

"Nope," Charlie said, popping the 'p' and ignoring Isaac's protests. "It takes black eyes about two weeks to heal and yours was fresh two days ago. There's no way it healed that quickly. It's physiologically impossible."

"Wha—how do you know that?" Isaac asked, giving her a strange look. He was getting a bit fidgety, nervous. "Who knows stuff like that?" Charlie didn't answer the question. Instead she grabbed at the messenger bag slung over her shoulder and began rooting around inside while Isaac stood by. "What are you doing?" Isaac demanded.

Finally, Charlie found what she was looking for. She snatched her cell phone out of her back and toggled through all the applications until she found the camera. Turning on the flash function, she held it up to Isaac's face, making him stumble backwards a bit in surprise. "Whoa!" he said, throwing his hands in front of his face. "I ask again, what the hell are you doing?"

"Testing a theory," Charlie mused under her breath. She hit the 'capture' button and waited impatiently for the millisecond it took for the photo to appear on the screen. She couldn't say what she saw surprised her, but it sure as hell pissed her off. There was what looked like a lens flare right around Isaac's eyes. She let out a bitter snort and shook her head down at the image. "Well that's just great," she spat. "That's just fan-freaking-tastic. It's just the cherry on top of this giant week of suck."

Isaac circled around her and peered over her shoulder at the image. "What are you talking about?" he demanded, his confusion mounting. "What are we looking at?"

Her response didn't come immediately. She needed to put the screwed up jigsaw puzzle that was her brain back into place first. She needed to make herself understand what was going on. And when she did, Charlie let out another, slightly demented laugh and turned around to face him directly. "Well, Isaac, I'm talking about the fact that you're a werewolf. That's what I'm talking about."

Isaac was pretty pale to begin with, but as soon at the words left her mouth it looked like he went about three shades whiter. "S—sorry, what did you just say? What are you talking about? I'm a what?"

"Well if you don't know, then you're really screwed," she muttered under her breath.

"You—you can't know that," Isaac stammered out, backing away from her a bit. "You're not supposed to know that—nobody's supposed to know that!"

"I mean you couldn't have been turned more that a few days ago and the full moon is tonight," Charlie continued to rant, throwing her hands in the air in frustration. "That gives you zero time to prepare yourself for what's going to happen, and it's not going to be pretty. What the hell was Derek thinking?!"

She didn't think Isaac could have possibly looked any more shocked, but apparently she was wrong. "Oh, crap. Holy sh—Y—you know Derek?"

"Of course I know that moron," Charlie growled back. "How are people still surprised by this? Isn't everybody used to me knowing what's going on by now?" She turned away from him and buried her face in her hands. What happened next? What was the protocol for this? She had been through a lot of crap, but newly-turned werewolves? That was something she had yet to deal with. She had gotten to skip that part of Scott's transformation. Nope. She couldn't think of a damn thing.

Charlie couldn't have looked away for more than half a minute, but by the time she looked up again, Isaac had disappeared. She was about to start spewing some exceptionally creative curses when she heard the shrill note of a whistle being blown. Lacrosse practice.

The way she took off, Charlie wouldn't have been surprised if there were clouds of dust being kicked up in her wake. She dodged through the gate of the fence and sprinted to the lacrosse field as quickly as she could manage. By the time she made it around the bleachers, the players were already making their way onto the field. Charlie skidded to a stop and forced herself to stand still as her eyes scoured the surrounding area, looking for Stiles and Scott. She found them sitting on the far set of bleachers, talking very closely. Charlie was just about to make her way over to them when the coach blew his whistle again. "Let's go!" the man's voice echoed across the field. "Line it up!"

"Shit," Charlie swore loudly. She started running across the field, earning strange looks from more than a few people and pretty much running into Stiles and Scott when she reached them. She had to clutch onto Stiles's shoulder to avoid toppling over. "Whoa," Stiles exclaimed. He put a hand on her waist to steady. She was so flustered that she almost didn't notice he left it there after she had regained her balance. "Hey," Stiles said, looking at her earnestly. "Hey, what's wrong?"

"We've got trouble," she hissed. "Like a giant crapstorm of trouble headed straight for us. It's a crapnado."

"What is it?" Scott asked urgently, leaning towards her. "Is it Lydia? Has something changed?"

"No," Charlie said, making Stiles give an audible sigh of relief. "No it's not Lydia. It's—"

Before she could get another word out, the sound of that obnoxious whistle pierced the air again. "Hey!" the coach shouted at them. "What did I say? I said get on the field! So break up your little...tea party or whatever the hell that you're doing over there, and get in the goal right now!"

"But—"

The whistle interrupted Scott again and the coach squared his shoulders against them. "Sorry, has the meaning of the word 'now' suddenly and miraculously changed?! Because the last time I checked it meant you do what I tell you to do, when I tell you to do it! Are you still confused? Do I need to get a dictionary to beat you over the head with?!"

Scott's jaw twitched slightly and he let out a groan. "No coach!"

"THEN GET THE HELL IN THE GOAL!"

Scott glanced back and forth between Charlie and the field, torn over what so do. Stiles smacked him in the chest and jerked his head in the direction of the goal. "Go. Use your wolfy powers to figure this out."

Scott nodded and glanced at Charlie one last time. "Sorry," he mumbled, looking at her with an apologetic expression before jogging out on the field.

Charlie's mouth open and closed a few times, suddenly feeling epically confused herself. "Wait a second, what are we figuring out?"

Stiles let out a sigh and rubbed at the back of his neck. "You're not gonna like this, but...Scott smelled another werewolf in the locker room. We're figuring out who it is." Charlie sighed heavily and pinched at the bridge of her nose. Stiles reached up and grabbed her wrist, pulling her hand away. "Hold up," he said, his eyes scanning her face. "Why do you not look surprised by what I'm telling you right now? You should—you should be insanely surprised! Like 'holy crap this information is blowing my mind' surprised. Why—why aren't you surprised?"

"You remember that crapnado I was talking about?" she said, raising her eyebrows at him. "It's sort of the same—"

And once again, with that spectacularly inconvenient timing, the coach's whistle blew. The shrill tone kept going and going for a seemingly endless amount of time, only to be replaced by the coach's equally irritating voice. "Stilinski! Once was an oddity, but twice...it's kind of baffling. Stop talking to girls and GET THE HELL ON THIS FIELD!"

"Son of a—" Stiles swore loudly and, like Scott, gave her an apologetic look. He grabbed Charlie by the shoulders and physically moved her to the first row of the bleachers and sat her down. "O—okay, just wait here. Right here. I'll find you after practice." Before Charlie could say anything he was sprinting on the field. Charlie slapped her hand on her forehead and let out a groan as she watched Stiles jog to the field. But even though Stiles was gone, Coach Finstock was still staring in her direction. He flashed a smile that could only be described as manically disturbing and waved at her with enthusiasm. Charlie grimaced back and gave a weak wave of her own, trying her best to block the thought of him and Mel from her brain. There was enough traumatizing stuff to begin with.

What happened next was a steaming pile of awkward. Apparently the big plan to figure out who the new werewolf was involved Scott abandoning his spot at the goal followed by body-slamming and sniffing every single member of his team as they tried to score on the goal. Even if she hadn't already figured it out already, she was pretty sure she could have come up with a couple of better strategies than that. She sat on the bleachers, elbows rested on her knees and hands covering her mouth as her foot bounced up and down frantically. As with most things these days, she got the distinct impression this was not going to go well. Her eyes darted back and forth, glancing between Stiles, Scott, and Isaac, hoping that everything wasn't going to blow up in their faces.

One by one, each lacrosse player hurled themselves towards Scott. Number 7. Number 12. Number 6. "It's Isaac!" Charlie murmured under her breath. "It's Isaac! Come on, Scott, put your freaking ears on! You are super-freaking-useless when you don't pay attention, you know that?"

There was a small cough somewhere next to her. Charlie twisted her head around to find some girl sitting behind her, eyeing her suspiciously. Or rather eyeing the crazy chick talking to herself. Charlie shot her a tight smile and nodded at her before turning back around and glowering at the field. "You know I'm getting tired of being ignored, you guys! I look like a total psycho right now!"

And then Number 14 was at the front of the line. Scott would know soon enough what was going on. Charlie didn't even realize it at first, but her leg had stopped bouncing up and down and she was holding her breath. From that moment on, it seemed like things were going in slow motion. She could hear her heartbeat in her ears. Even though it was racing, the beats sounded slow to her. The two padded figures collided with a sickening crack, the force of it causing them to spin in the air.

The two of them hit the ground the same way—in the crouched position, ready for round two. Charlie slowly got to her feet, silently praying for them both to back the hell off. Neither of them moved. No attack. No retreat. No nothing. Charlie was just beginning to calm down until yet another problem—or rather _the_ problem—literally came out of left field and walked into the middle of the practice. Two policemen were heading straight for Isaac. And neither of them looked particularly warm and cuddly, especially seeing as one of them was Deputy Sean.

One thing was for sure—they were royally and epically screwed. And it wasn't even first period yet.

Well, shit.

**SOUNDTRACK UPDATE**

**There's a link to my spotify account on my profile if you want to check it out.**

**Chapter 6 Soundtrack**

Charlie receives a wake-up call a little earlier in the morning than she would like.

-~-~-~-~-Another Girl (Robin Hannibal Rework) – Wild Belle

Lydia faces down her classmates and reasserts her confidence.

-~-~-~-~-Natural One – Shearwater

Charlie hallucinates and then runs out of the school.

-~-~-~-~-Born Whole – Doe Paoro

Charlie finds out Isaac is a werewolf, watches the lacrosse practice, sees the cops approach.

-~-~-~-~-Baby Did a Bad, Bad Thing – Chris Isaak


	7. Let Slip the Dogs of War

**Disclaimer: 'Teen Wolf' isn't mine. Shocking, right? But it's true. If there are any similarities in content or dialogue, it has probably originated with the show.**

**A huge thank you to Monkey . gone . to . heaven , easythrowaway, beautifulgreek523, Bookiee, Ayine, katiesgotagun, YellowSubmarine93, Daenerys86, Gee Brittany, onethousandmoths, SK-Scatenato, Wolfihood, lyssalightwing, Female whovian, Tania, ForgeandGred4Ever, Roxu, TheMMMG, bagginsoftheshire666, hellohaha, TWsos12345, AspiredWriterr, WhatsGoingOn, FreckleFacedFrieda, Guest, KreativeGirl, Shes-The-Proto-Type, Guest, Etro13, Undeniable Weirdness, zvc56, Hanna, swanqueen4, Aoibhinn, Lammestrellicon, Smiles in the Shadows, X23 Maximoff, Jayjay 329, Asha, Just Anonymous, ParalyzedInHeaven, Guest, and Lady Shagging Godiva (so good to hear from you again!) for your reviews! I appreciate it so much, you have no idea!**

Chapter 7 – Let Slip the Dogs of War

Entropy. It was the tendency of all the elements within a closed system, when left to their own devices, to progress towards disorder and chaos. Technically it was physics term, most closely related to the first law of thermodynamics, but generally Charlie liked to think about it in relation to the state of messiness of her room. She would clean it every Saturday and then somehow by the end of the week—through no fault of her own—it would like a tornado had ripped through it. Laundry would form small, disorganized piles, books and papers would be scattered everywhere, and the whole process would start over again. It was a cycle—she would put in the effort, entropy would do its thing, and she'd be left right where she had started. In the middle of a giant mess.

That's where she, Stiles, Scott, and now Allison kept finding themselves—in the middle of a giant mess the universe had created for them. And then they would run around all crazy-like, looking for clues and forming plans until by some miracle, they managed to clean everything up. It was hard and usually more than a little painful, but they got the job done. After that they got about two minutes where they got to feel like everything was going to be okay. But Beacon Hills was just like her damn room. It would never stay neat. As hard as they tried, they couldn't stop entropy. It was literally a force of nature. They could spend all the energy they had fighting it, trying to put those bits and pieces back in place to make a pretty picture, but as soon as they were done the whole process would over again and they'd be left with yet another mess to clean up. And from the looks of things, this one was going to be a doozy.

Charlie sat at her desk, pen in one hand and head propped up by the other. She was staring directly at the board in front of her, but if somebody had asked her what was being written on it, she couldn't have told them. Hell, the only reason she even knew she was in chemistry class was because of the unmistakably grating sound of Harris's voice. She wasn't registering the words he was saying—his voice sounded kind of like one of the adults from the Peanuts cartoons—but that voice had some inherent quality to it that automatically pissed her off. Which wasn't helping her current anxiety levels in the slightest.

If Charlie was at all interested in sports metaphors, she would have said that they were in the fourth quarter or ninth inning or something, but it would have just been a way of dressing up the very simple concept that they were totally and epically screwed. The standings didn't inspire much hope:

1) Isaac was a werewolf

2) Isaac's dad had been killed

3) The police were investigating Isaac for said death

4) Isaac could be detained for 24 hours if he was a suspect

5) Isaac had been abused by his dad, giving him motive and making him a plausible suspect

6) The full moon was that night

Any one of those elements could have been a fairly significant problem. Add them all up, and the sum was Isaac sitting in a cell and wolfing out in front of the entire sheriff's station. It spelled complete disaster. And that was before she took into account Gerard and the sudden abandonment of the hunter's code of ethics. So now they were all left trying to come up with solutions to an impossible problem. And that very vacant spot where Isaac would usually sit was preventing her from thinking about any of the things she should be thinking about. Chemistry, for example.

The worst part of it was that as much as this situation terrified Charlie, it made perfect sense to her. There was even a part of her that could look at it as a good thing. Derek was always going to find himself a pack. There was no way they could have prevented that—it was an inevitability. And where had Derek gone to start his pack? He found a boy who was broken and vulnerable and abused, and then he gave him something that could make him stronger. Something that would make him able to stand up for himself. If she blocked out all the other panic-inducing stuff, she would even have applauded him for it. He had probably rationalized the whole thing. Derek had always said that the bite was a gift, and he was giving it to the person who needed it the most. Charlie could understand that. It was good, noble even. But then again, maybe he had just gone and offered it to the person who was most likely to say yes. And all that other panic-inducing stuff? It was still there, which meant that Derek's decision was also very, very stupid.

Isaac didn't kill his dad. Charlie didn't know him all that well and she was fairly certain she had only gotten the tiniest glimpse of his relationship with his father, however bad it might be, but she was a pretty good judge of character when it came to people. She wasn't sure how it came about, but she had a way of understanding their motivations, whether or not she agreed with them or approved of them. And Isaac wasn't a killer. At least he wouldn't be if he had control over his actions. Once you threw 'werewolf' into the equation, the lines got a little bit blurred.

All of the sudden Charlie's view of the chalk board was obstructed by a very large hand snapping in her face. Charlie jumped in surprise, making her elbow slip against the smooth black laminate of the table and almost making her face plant on it. Her head jerked violently and she grabbed the edge of the table to steady herself before glowering at the owner of said hand. "Danny, what the hell?!" she hissed, careful to keep her voice lo enough that Harris couldn't hear. "Scare the crap out of me, why don't you?"

"Just checking to see if you were alive," Danny snorted. "You had a sort of 'I'm staring into the void' look."

"I'm in chemistry class," she grumbled back. "Where else would I be staring?"

And with that she turned away from Danny again, only this time instead of looking absently at the board, her eyes focused in on Stiles and Scott. The two of them were paying even less attention to the lesson than she was, which was saying a lot. They were hunched over their books and whispering at each other at a level just below her auditory capacity. Charlie was in no way considering becoming a werewolf, but she could really appreciate the practicality of the whole 'enhanced senses' thing at the moment. She was busy wallowing in frustration when there was a sharp poke in left shoulder. Swearing under her breath, she rounded on Danny who was staring at her with raised eyebrows. "Dude," she grumbled. "What are you doing?"

"What's going on with you today?" he whispered.

Charlie shrugged her shoulders and jerked her head to the side noncommittally. "Nothing. Why?"

"Well you keep staring off into space with this concussed look on your face," he said, inclining his head in her direction. "Plus there's the fact that you haven't hit on me once so far. You usually manage to throw in at least one cheesy pick-up line before second period."

"Well maybe you're just not looking especially attractive to me today," she drawled out, making a face at him.

Danny let out a loud scoff and leaned back in his chair, shooting her a skeptical look. "Please. We both know that's not true."

Charlie tsked and smirked widely. "Of course it isn't, you beautiful Adonis, you. You're a teenage Casanova, breaking hearts and forgetting names."

"Creepy," Danny murmured, wrinkling his nose at her.

"That's how I roll," Charlie replied with a passive shrug.

Danny rolled his eyes theatrically. "Whatever, creeper," he mumbled. "So what's got your panties in a twist, then?"

"I don't know, Danny," Charlie grumbled, getting a little bit frustrated by the sudden interrogation. "Maybe I just want to pay attention during Mr. Harris's super-important lecture. I'm soaking in the knowledge. Has that ever occurred to you?"

Danny scoffed loudly and gestured at her paper. "Literally the only thing you've written down this entire class is 'Mr. Harris is a douche'."

Furrowing her eyebrows in confusion, Charlie glanced down at the lined pad of paper in front of her. Next to a few doodles of birds were the clearly spelled words 'Mr. Harris is a douche'. "Huh," she muttered making a face at the paper. "Maybe I thought that was the big takeaway lesson here."

"And it took you four months to figure that out?" Danny snorted. "Maybe you're not as freakishly smart as I though you were."

"And now it's my turn to say puh-leeze," she replied with a sickly sweet smile. "And I'm also going to need to borrow your notes for today."

Danny sighed heavily and shook his head. "Was already planning on it."

Charlie smirked and opened her mouth to let fly another cheesy pick-up line, but before she could something else caught her attention. That something being the flailing arms of one Stiles Stilinski. Charlie frowned at him quizzically. "What?" Stiles gestured frantically at the guy sitting next to her, making Charlie roll her eyes slightly. She smacked Danny in the arm and inclined her head in Stiles's direction. Something which Danny did not appear all that enthusiastic about.

"Danny!" Stiles whispered. "Where's Jackson?"

Danny shot Charlie a glance that clearly spelled 'why the hell is he talking to me?' before turning back to Stiles. "In the principal's office talking to your dad," he replied shortly.

At those words Charlie's head snapped around and Danny found her, Stiles, and Scott all staring at him with wide, slightly manic-looking eyes. "Jackson's talking to the cops?" Charlie demanded.

Danny blinked at the sudden degree of highly focused attention and shrugged before continuing. "Um, yeah," he muttered back. "Where else do you think he'd be?"

"I don't know," Charlie hissed. "Trying on scarves, product testing hair gel, stealing food from homeless people, or any of the other hobbies I'm sure he has. Why the hell would Jackson be talking to the cops in the first place?"

"Maybe because he lives across the street from Isaac," he shot back rather snarkily, like that was a piece of information they should all have already been privy to.

Stiles made eye contact with Charlie for about half a second before spinning around in his seat and exchanging some more hushed whispers with Scott. Letting out a small groan, Charlie leaned forwards, resting her arms on the table and perching her chin on her folded hands. Great. They were probably coming up with a half-assed plan and, as per usual, she was being left in the dark. As it turned out insomnia had its benefits. It was a good thing she had gotten so ahead in the lessons, because there was no way she'd be paying even the slightest bit of attention today. The sound of someone clearing his throat drew her attention away from the wallowing. She peeked up to see Danny staring at her with slightly judgmental eyes. "Whatever weird crap you guys are into this time," he sad, waving a finger in her face, "do me a favor and keep me out of it."

Charlie lifted a single hand and gave him a lazy salute, waiting to see what would come next. She didn't have to wait that long. Under two minutes later a crumpled up piece of paper was sailing through the air and smacked Mr. Harris in the back of the head with a scary degree of accuracy. There was a round of sniggering from the classroom, but Charlie's face was frozen in her patented 'oh, shit' expression. Mr. Harris's spine stiffened visibly and his head snapped around, facing down the class.

"Who in the hell did that?"

His beady eyes scoured the classroom, like he was trying to stare into the souls of all the students and figure out which of them committed such a violent assault. As soon as his gaze fell on any student in particular, any hint of laughter immediately stopped and they froze in fear. Charlie could swear that Mr. Harris was almost disappointed when he got his answer so quickly. It meant he had to focus his rage instead of letting it explode all over the place. But it was pretty much impossible to ignore the two idiots in the middle of the room pointing directly at each other. Charlie couldn't help groaning and rolling her eyes. She couldn't see their faces, but she could just picture the expressions. They were so damn pleased with themselves.

Mr. Harris's face screwed up into an expression of complete, unbridled, and yet oddly controlled rage, folding his arms across his chest as he faced down the two delinquents. "Mr. McCall, Mr. Stilinski," he drawled out in that hostile tone of his, practically spitting as he pronounced Stiles's name. "The juvenile tactics that you resort to should surprise me by now, but the fact that I have serious doubts that either of you have managed to progress past a third-grade reading level does rather soften the blow." He leaned down and picked up the crumpled up paper from the ground, then holding it up in front him like it was on display. "In fact, I would go so far as to say that your impossibly small brains hold about as much substance as this piece of paper."

He began to unfold the paper, making a big show of smoothing it out. When he was done, he picked it back up, a slimy smirk pulling at his lips as he looked down at it. "Would you look at that?" he said, holding it up for the entire class to see. "It's blank."

There was another round of sniggering, but this time it was softer and more restrained. But that didn't stop Stiles from clearing his throat and throwing his hand in the air. "Not trying to tell you how to do your job or anything, but isn't this the part where you, you know, punish us? I mean we did just totally undercut your authority just now. I mean one of us did. We didn't both throw the thing. That would—that would be ridiculous."

Mr. Harris's rat-like eyes narrowed into slits as he stared at Stiles. "Mr. Stilinski, I would rather lobotomize myself than spend another five minutes in the face to the sheer idiocy that seems to ooze out of your every pore, so I'm going to leave your punishment to a higher power."

"God?" Stiles said, his head perking up a bit.

Stiles elbowed Scott, making him jump in surprise. "Ah—bwah...Bill Gates?" Scott stammered in confusion, trying to play along with his friend.

"A magic-8 ball," Stiles piled on.

"Oprah?"

Stiles snapped his fingers and pointed at Scott, nodding enthusiastically in agreement. "Oh, yeah! That's—that's good one." Mr. Harris glared at the pair of them with such an intensity Charlie was surprised they didn't spontaneously burst into flame. Especially given the number of flammable chemicals in the area. Stiles just leaned towards Scott conspiratorially. "Dude," he said in a loud whisper. "I don't think he's talking about Oprah."

"You're going to the principal's office," Mr. Harris growled. "And I will rejoice in the fact that I will be spared looking at your vacant faces for another 32 minutes." Stiles and Scott lingered in their seats for a few moments, not quite sure of what to do next. That is, until Mr. Harris's voice echoed against the walls of the classroom. "Leave. Now."

In a small flurry of activity, Stiles and Scott scrambled to get all their books together, frantically shoving them in their bag. They tossed their bags over their shoulders and headed for the door, but not before Stiles sent her a wide grin and thumbs-up. She returned both of them, but her response took of a significantly more sarcastic tone. He rolled his eyes in response, but his lack of appreciation for _her_ lack of enthusiasm was somewhat undercut when he tripped on one of the legs of the desk, sending him stumbling a little bit. The two boys practically sprinted to the door, slamming it behind therm. Once they were gone, Mr. Harris turned back to the chalkboard. "Well," he said as he began to sketch out the next equation. "Now that the average IQ of the room has been raised five points, let's get on with the lesson, shall we?"

Grumbling to herself, Charlie looked down at her notebook, the words 'Mr. Harris is a douche' clearly written across the paper. "You can say that again," she mumbled under her breath.

"Why do you hang out with them so much?" Danny asked. "Because I've been trying to figure it out, and I'm just not getting it."

Charlie looked at the door the two boys had just exited before glowering back at Danny. "Says the guy who plays friend to Super-douche," she muttered back. "Seriously. Instead of the cape he's got all those pretentious scarves."

"What's with the sudden interest in Jackson's scarves?" Danny demanded.

"Okay, one," Charlie replied, holding up a single finger, "you just made the leap from 'Super-douche' to Jackson totally on your own and I feel that should be acknowledged. Two—" she lifted a second finger "—I'm commenting on the scarves because they look totally ridiculous."

After that, Charlie tried to pay attention to the lesson. Really, she did. But listening to Harris talk was difficult enough in the first place seeing as every time she heard his voice she instinctively wanted to punch someone in the face. It didn't matter whose face, just somebody's face. And right now Danny was sitting closest to her and his face was just too pretty to mess up. That would have been the problem on a normal day—a day when where weren't rogue, freshly-turned werewolves and full moons and cops and feuds with close friends and other friends that went on naked forest walks and she was coping with newly-discovered romantic feelings for yet another close friend...dear God, what had her life turned into? It was equal parts soap opera and straight-to-television horror movie.

Ugh. This was the worst. The absolute worst. And for once, Harris wasn't actually the primary thing making her miserable. It was that damn curiosity. The whole 'not knowing' thing was something she was never really good at. It was like there was somebody sitting in the chair next to her, constantly poking her in the shoulder and whispering, 'Hey! There's something really, really interesting going on! And you've got no clue what it is! Suck it!' Yup. The imaginary voice in her head just told her to suck it. Her imagination was kind of a dick. Did that make her a dick? No. Focus, Charlie. That was a question for another time. Or never. Never was better. Ugh. Why did Stiles and Scott keep coming up with plans and not telling her about them? She thought they were past that by now.

Everything around Charlie was getting exceptionally loud. The ticking of the clock, the scratching of pencils against paper, and Greenburg's mouth-breathing all echoed in her ears. And then there was the general sound of Harris's ego. It kind of sounded like Darth Vader's 'Imperial Death March'. Or Tibetan throat singing. Charlie's knee began bouncing up and down faster and faster as she got more and more impatient. Then she looked up at the clock again, and her heart fell. It had only been three minutes since Tweedledum and Tweedledumber had made their loud, un-stealthy, altogether uncoordinated escape. The levels of frustration and anxiety kept getting higher and higher until...nope. No. She couldn't do it—not anymore. No more getting side-lined. She ground her teeth together, steeling her resolve, and threw her pencil down with conviction. "Screw it."

At the sound of her voice Danny's head popped up again. "Screw what now?" he mumbled, blinking in confusion. Charlie sighed and pressed her lips together in a determined line, lifting a single hand in the air. When she did, the confused look on his was wiped away and replaced by one of sheer, unadulterated horror. "No," he whispered, shaking his head at her. "No. No, no, no. Charlie, put your hand down." Charlie shrugged apologetically and left it in the air, waiting for Mr. Harris turned around. Danny's jaw twitched violently as he glowered at her. "Charlie. Put it—put it down!" he said through clenched teeth. "I'm serious! Hand. Down. Now. Seriously! Put it down!"

From the looks of things he was just getting started, but, as luck would have it, Mr. Harris turned around and caught sight of her. There was that typical sigh of frustration before he spoke. "Yes, Ms. Oswin," he drawled out in a hostile tone. "What pressing matter do you have to share with the rest of the class today? Dazzle me."

"I have to go to the nurse," Charlie said simply. She let her hand drop out of the air, and it hit the table pretty much at the same time as Danny's forehead.

"You have got to be kidding me," Danny groaned.

Mr. Harris had just about the same reaction as Danny did, only a hell of a lot more judgmental. He let out a skeptical scoff and folded his arms across his chest, staring at her like she was a particularly gross specimen of slime mold. "I'm not sure the nurse will be sufficient to properly address the problems you've been afflicted with, Ms. Oswin."

Charlie pursed her lips and shook her head. "Nah," she murmured. "I think Mrs. Talbot is more than capable."

Mr. Harris blinked at her contradiction and started taking small steps in her direction. "Really?" he demanded. "And, pray tell, what is it that ails you exactly? You don't look sick to me. You're the picture of health. What exactly is your excuse?"

"Cramps."

That one word seemed be enough to throw Harris at least a little bit off guard. He suddenly stopped his approach about halfway between the chalkboard and where she was sitting. A small round of sniggering broke out once again in the classroom. Danny, on the other hand, emitted a low groan of frustration. Harris exhaled sharply and raised his eyebrows to the point that they appeared above the frames of his glasses. "Cramps?"

"Mm-hmm," Charlie said, solemnly nodding. "Cramps."

Harris let out another passive-aggressive laugh and raised his hand to his face like a poker player trying to hide his cards. "That's interesting," he murmured. "You don't seem to be in any sort of pain."

"I tend to internalize my pain," Charlie replied simply. "It feels like someone is trying to tear out my uterus through my bellybutton."

"Thank you Ms. Oswin," he drawled out, "for that...vivid imagery." He continued his slow and unnecessarily dramatic approach to her desk until he was standing directly in front of her, looming like a dark storm cloud. It was probably the only scenario where he actually got to be taller than most people. When he finally removed his hand from his face, it revealed a cold, sadistic smirk. "Seeing as you are so eager to get out of this class room, you can go. But you will be joining Mr.'s McCall and Stilinski at the principal's office."

"For what?" Charlie demanded making a face at him.

Apparently Mr. Harris didn't like the lack of respect conveyed by said face, because his eyes narrowed as he looked at her. "For cutting class."

"But I'm sitting in your classroom," Charlie protested, throwing her arms wide. "How could I possibly be cutting class?"

"I've been teaching long enough to know the signs of degenerate delinquency when I see them," Harris returned. "Let's just say I'm taking a preemptive strike against your own stupidity. Maybe that way some sort of discipline will sink in through that thick skull of yours."

"So you're punishing me for something we haven't done yet?" Charlie replied, raising her eyebrows at him. "Are we in 'The Minority Report' right now?"

"We are in my class, Ms. Oswin," he shot back with a smugness that kind of made her want to smack that smirk right off his face. "When we're in my classroom, we play by my rules. And I must say I am disappointed but not surprised that you used a Tom Cruise movie to make your argument."

"Actually I was referencing the 1956 Philip K. Dick short story," Charlie quipped back.

Of all the things she had said, for some reason that one sentence seemed to make Harris the angriest. The spine stiffened, the jaw twitched, and somehow the eyes seemed to get even beadier than usual. He pulled himself to his full height, which admittedly wasn't all that impressive, but for a few seconds that nightmare of him lighting her on fire with a Bunsen burner seemed more plausible than she was entirely comfortable with. "Pack up your things and get out," he ordered. After staring at him evenly for a few minutes, Charlie turned back to her desk and began packing up her things. In true form, Harris smirked down at her. "I'm afraid you'll be receiving a zero for the in-class problem set today," he threw in, nodding at the page 73 problems he had written out on the board. "Seeing as you won't be here to complete them."

"Oh, that's not going to be an issue," Charlie mumbled as she amassed her papers.

Harris let out a derisive snort. "Of course it won't."

With that he turned his back to her and headed back to the front of the class. In a gloriously immature moment, Charlie stuck her tongue out at his back. The second Harris got out of earshot, Danny leaned in her direction, fixing her with a judgmental glare. "Cramps? Really?"

"It doesn't invite questions," Charlie muttered back. She flipped through her notebook until she got to the desired page and neatly extracted a few of the sheets, careful to scribble her name on all of them.

"It didn't exactly work, did it?" he shot back. "I heard a lot of questions.'

"Well Harris is an abnormality, isn't he?"

"Was that really necessary?" Danny piled on, staring down at the papers she was shuffling around with a small degree of curiosity.

"What can I say?" Charlie sighed. She clicked her pen dramatically and threw it in her bag. "When I commit to a course of action, I really commit."

"You mean you should be committed?" Danny corrected for her.

"Ha, ha, ha. Very funny. I can hardly breathe from laughing." She finished shoving all the things in her bag except for those few pieces of paper and punched Danny lightly in the shoulder. "See you on the other side."

Charlie pushed back her chair and got to her feet before slinging her messenger bag over her shoulder. Yet again, there was another round of soft snorts as she walked by the rest of her fellow classmates—she was pretty sure she even heard one of them muttering 'dead girl walking'—but she still came to a stop next to Mr. Harris's desk. His eyes flickered in her direction, but he didn't turn from the board. Without saying anything, she reached down and picked up the stapler sitting on the desk corner, using it to staple those loose pages together. She dropped them on his desk and moved to the door, but before she could leave, his voice made her halt.

"And what would these be?" Harris demanded, brandishing the pages at her.

"Those are the problems for page 73," she deadpanned, nodding at the board. "I got a little ahead in the work."

Charlie didn't leave any opportunity for a retort. She spun on her heel and marched out the classroom as requested, letting the door close gently behind her. As soon as she managed to escape the classroom, a giant grin split across her face and she had to shove a fist in her mouth to keep from exploding with laughter. The plan hadn't worked exactly according to plan. Okay, it hadn't worked at all as she had planned. But the end result was still the same and that counted for something, right? She walked briskly through the hallway making two lefts and a right before she found them.

When Charlie found the wonder twins, she couldn't help but roll her eyes. Stiles was sitting in the chair closest to the door of the principal's office with Scott right next to him. They were practically pressing their ears to the glass to hear what was being said on the other side, something that seemed a little bit unnecessary in Scott's case... The both of them were so preoccupied, neither seemed to notice her approach and when she dropped into the empty seat next to Scott they both jumped in surprise. Stiles's eyes widened and his head snapped back and forth, looking around the hallways like they were about to be mobbed by flying monkeys. Once he assured himself that the coast was clear, he scrambled out of the chair he was sitting in and collapsed in the one on Charlie's other side. Suddenly had two sets of wide eyes staring at her from either side like they were expecting her to explain something. Charlie glanced back and forth between them, unsure of what to say. "What?"

"Charlie, what are you doing here?" Scott whispered, looking at her urgently.

"The same thing you are," she shot back. "And by the way, thanks for icing me out again. That was super-cool of you."

"We were getting ourselves detention," Stiles hissed from her other side, making her head snap around to look at him. "Is that something you really wanted to be a part of?" He blinked at her and cocked his head to the side curiously. "Wait how did you get Harris to let you out too? Gah—don't tell me you threw something at him. Once was stupid, twice is just ridiculous. I know it's really tempting but—"

"Please," Charlie said, rolling her eyes. "I said I had to go to the nurse."

"For what?" Scott whispered.

"Cramps."

The reaction was pretty much instantaneous, and exactly what Charlie typically expected. Confusion, discomfort, horror, the sudden desire to run straight from the room whilst screaming at the top of their lungs. All the usual reactions flitted across both of their faces. Stiles actually stuck his tongue out, flinching a bit. It was Scott who managed to start talking first. "Is it—is it true?"

"Jesus, Scott, no!" Charlie hissed, smacking him in the chest. "Get with the program."

"Wh—what program?" Stiles demanded. "This is not a program we—" he gestured between him and Scott "—we are not in on this program! We are far, far away from this program! As far as I'm concerned, that program doesn't exist. I—"

"Exactly," Charlie said, nodding him.

"What 'exactly'?" Stiles hissed, using air quotes. "You can't just say 'exactly' and expect everybody to spectacularly know what you're talking about!"

"Your instinctive fear of girly parts gives us an inherent conversational advantage in some cases. It's a special superpower. Watch this." She cleared her throat and shifted in her seat. The next word came out as a whisper. "Tampon." The both of them shivered in discomfort, their faces scrunching up into uncomfortable expressions. Snorting to herself Charlie snapped her fingers and pointed back and forth between the two boys. 'You see that reaction right there? That's your weakness. Start talking about that kind of thing and you try and get out of the conversation so quickly you really don't even care what you agreed to."

The appalled expression dropped off Stiles's face and was replaced by one of curiosity. He opened and closed his mouth a few times. "Bwah, that...that actually works?"

"Um, yeah," Charlie replied as if it was the most obvious thing in the world. "Do you have any idea how many times I got out of being grounded?"

"It's true," Scott whispered, staring out into space with an expression of awe.

"Wha—? How would you know it works?" Stiles protested.

"That time I was sneaking around in Kate's bag and she accused me of stealing something?" he clarified. "Charlie said, uh, what she said and Kate backed off. Like immediately."

"I have power," Charlie said, nodding to herself. "I'm a wizard."

"It even worked with Harris?" Scott whispered, looking oddly impressed.

Charlie winced heavily and shook her head. "Afraid not. He just sent me to the principal's office for 'attempting to ditch class'," she muttered using air quotes. "No impact on him whatsoever. Reason thirty-eight why I'm pretty sure he's a sociopath."

"There are only thirty-eight reasons?" Scott mumbled bitterly.

"Okay, guys?" Stiles interjected, waving his hands around frantically to catch their attention. "As interesting and...illuminating as all this is, I think we need to start paying attention to what's going on in there."

"Right," Charlie muttered, settling into her seat. "What did I miss?"

"Nothing yet," Stiles replied. "It's been all the standard, lead-in stuff. State your address, state your name for the record, that kind of thing. But my dad should be getting to the important stuff soon."

At that, the three of them settled in for the ride. They probably looked kind of ridiculous, all their ears pressed against the glass. Luckily for them, though, no questions were inspired. The hallway remained deserted. Charlie sucked in a deep, nervous breath and thought about what exactly was going to be revealed next. But for some reason the sound of Sheriff Stilinski's voice on the other side of the glass calmed her down a bit. He would do what he could. He always did.

After a minute or so of the typical questions, the sheriff got to the pertinent stuff. Charlie didn't even realize that she was holding her breath until her lungs started screaming out for air. "Do you think there would be any reason for Isaac to want to hurt his father?" she heard the sheriff's voice ask.

"Um, yeah," Jackson's cocky, rage-inducing voice replied. "Sure. Absolutely."

There was a pause in the conversation and that feeling of anxiety in the pit of Charlie's stomach began to grow. "You care to elaborate a little bit?" the sheriff pressed, clearly not amused by the hostile witness he was being forced to deal with.

"Well for starter's the guy's an ass," Jackson pointed out.

Charlie let out a bitter snort and ground her teeth together. "Isn't that the pot calling the kettle a dick," she muttered before being theatrically shushed by Stiles.

"Okay," the sheriff continued, his frustration mounting. "Is there anything you can tell me about what might have happened last night? Anything at all out of the ordinary that might give us some hint where to look?"

Next Charlie had the privilege to listen to one of Jackson's self-involved, stuck-up sighs. The sound of it made her blood boil a bit, but she locked down that frustration she felt every time he opened his mouth. It wouldn't be useful. "Yeah," Jackson finally replied. "Lahey comes running out of the house all scared and twitchy, gets on his bike, and takes off. Then his dad comes out yelling, gets in the car, and goes after him."

"And when was this?" the sheriff pressed.

"I don't know—like 10:00?" Jackson groaned. "10:30? I mean it's not like I keep track of all the crap that goes on over there. Not my problem."

Sheriff Stilinski exhaled sharply, but by some miracle managed to keep his temper. "Do you have any idea why Isaac would have run out of the house in the middle of the night?"

"Probably because his deadbeat dad was wailing on him again."

As soon as the words were uttered, something in the changed. It was like the temperature had suddenly dropped about twenty degrees and sudden feeling of nausea coursed through Charlie's body. She had some idea of what was going on in the Lahey house, but it was just that. An idea. An idea was unformed, hypothetical—it could be refuted or disproven. And she really hoped her idea of what was going on could be refuted. Confirmation that her suspicions were right? That made everything so, so much worse.

"Listen you—you're telling me you _knew_ Isaac's father was hitting him?" Sheriff Stilinski asked, his voice colored by disbelief.

"Hitting him?" Jackson continued in that arrogant tone of his. "He was kicking the crap out of him."

"Did you tell anyone?" the sheriff asked. "Teachers, parents, anyone?"

"Nope," Jackson replied casually. "It's not my problem."

At that point her ears shut off. She didn't need to hear anything else. Being without words wasn't something Charlie was used to. But her rage didn't need any words. It was a single, overwhelming sensation that flooded through until it filled up every single part of her being. A mental image was forming in her head. Jackson was casually sitting in the chair, legs crossed, looking around with an air of superiority, completely at ease as he discussed the sustained abuse of one his teammates and checking his watch to see how much longer he would have to deal with the sheriff. Charlie had never liked Jackson, that much she had made perfectly clear. But there had always been the possibility that he had some redeeming characteristics. Danny liked him, Lydia loved him—there must have been something she didn't see. So she had always allowed for the slim possibility that maybe, just maybe, she could possibly find a way to at least tolerate him. Now she was done. She was done even looking for a reason not to hate him.

It was only when she heard Stiles say her name that anything broke through. "Charlie, are you okay?" Stiles whispered.

Charlie exhaled sharply through gritted teeth and shook her head. "I'm fine, Stiles," she said in a tight voice that was in no way believable. "I'm just trying to come up with the most effective way of killing Jackson and getting away with it. An overdose of potassium is pretty much impossible to detect and would trigger a cardiac event. Scott's mom is a nurse so she could probably take care of that for us. And it's fairly easy to miss a needle mark when it's under the toenail. Being knocked out unconscious during a lacrosse game isn't entirely out of the realm of possibility."

"Okay..." Stiles drawled out. "That's a scarily specific plan."

"Woah," Scott murmured, eyeing her warily. "Is that actually a thing? Like could that work?"

Charlie didn't respond. If she began to speak again, she was pretty sure she would start screaming. And once those floodgates were opened, she wasn't certain she would be able to stop. She grabbed onto the arms of the chair, physically holding on so she could fight the urge to burst into the office and drag Jackson out but his perfectly coiffed hair. Except the hair gel would probably make it impossible to hold onto it. But that was okay. The neck would work just as well. She was going into an anger spiral. Isaac had been abused for who knows how long, and Jackson had known. He had known the whole time, and he hadn't had the decency to pick up the damn phone.

"Don't do it," Stiles said, nudging her in the side with his elbow.

"Don't do what?" Charlie bit out, actively not looking at him.

"Punch Jackson in the face," he replied. "One of the many faces of Charlotte Oswin is the 'I'm gonna punch someone in the face' face. And you're wearing that face right now. It's written all over—" he waved a hand around her face "—here. Don't do it."

"You're asking a lot," Charlie growled.

"Then at least wait till after school," he mumbled back. He kicked his feet out in front of him and sunk lower in his seat. "We've got work to do and you being banned from school property isn't going to help." She could feel his eyes on her as she spoke, but still didn't look at him. "Hey, we're gonna do everything we can to help Isaac now. It's all we can do."

Charlie had been staring out at nothing in particular, but her eyes snapped up to Stiles's. He was staring at her with an expression of concern and regret with an intensity that made her shift uncomfortably in her seat. She swallowed heavily and looked down at her hands where they were gripping the arm rest of the chair. The knuckles were white as they strained against the skin. She bit her lip and tried to fight back the rage, but she was pretty sure she was losing. Then another hand appeared next to hers. Stiles reached down and placed his hand on the armrest of his chair as well, but the seats were placed so close together, his hand brushed gently against hers. It was weird. She had punched him in the shoulder and hugged him and kissed him on the cheek, but for some reason that square inch of skin brushing against his hand felt like a jolt of electricity. She had to physically stop herself from grabbing hold of his hand and lacing their fingers together. But she didn't move her hand. And neither did he.

Suddenly the door to the office was wrenched open and a tall figure clothed in khaki stepped through. Before Charlie even had to register whose head was balanced on top of that uniform, Stiles had managed to conjure up two 'Us' magazines from somewhere and was scrambling to get one of them open. The other one landed in her lap. "What the hell are you doing?" she hissed, waving the magazine at him and missing the feeling of his skin against her own.

Stiles didn't say anything. He just peeked up over top of the magazine for about half a second before hiding behind it again. "Don't look at me!" he hissed. "Use the magazine! Be stealth-like!"

"What?"

He glanced sideways at her from behind the magazine with wide eyes, like he was trying to warn her off. "I said—ugh—just—dammit!"

When she turned around to face in front of her, she found herself staring at the sheriff. Hands shoved deep in his pockets, he dragged his feet as he came to a stop in front of them. His eyes were trained on the magazine Stiles was currently hiding behind. Sighing heavily, he turned to the other one of the wonder twins. "Scott," he said rather loudly. Scott smiled and gave an uncomfortable nod, leaving the sheriff one more person to address. "Charlie," he said turning to her. "I'm a little surprised to see you here."

"They, uh, called me down here to give me a commendation for perfect attendance," Charlie blurted out quickly.

The sheriff snorted skeptically and raised his eyebrows at her. "Really? They called you out of class to give you an award for perfect attendance."

"H—yeah," Charlie laughed nervously. "That irony...was not lost on me either."

She really couldn't tell if the sheriff was entertained or annoyed. She was getting quite used to seeing that look on his face. The sheriff narrowed his eyes at Scott and Charlie and the both of them just smiled back, exchanging a look as they did so. Finally the sheriff let out a heavy sigh and nodded at them. "I'm sure I'll be seeing the two of you soon enough."

The sheriff's eyes lingered for a few moments on the back of the magazine before slowly walking down the hallway. As the sound of the footsteps got softer and softer, Stiles peaked over the edge of the magazine, his eyes darting right and left, to check if the coast was clear. Charlie rolled her eyes heavily and snatched the thing out of his hand. "Alright, master of disguise," she muttered. "The coast is clear. Your dad's gone."

"Dude, I told you to use the magazine," Stiles complained.

"It's a magazine, not an invisibility cloak," Charlie shot back, smacking him in the chest with said rolled up magazine. "And next time you need me to hide behind one of those things, make sure it's something of substance. Think less 'Us Weekly' and more 'Time' or 'National Geographic'."

Stiles narrowed his eyes at her and shook his head. "You sound really judgmental right now."

Charlie wrinkled her nose again and opened her mouth for a retort, but before she could the door to the principal's office squeaked loudly and another figure stepped through. As soon as he saw them, that typical, arrogant smirk formed on his face. "Well would you look at this," he sneered. "The Three Stooges, right here in Beacon Hills. Which one of you is going to hit the other ones over the head with a hammer?" He paused for a moment before holding up a hand to make them stop. "You know what, I don't care. It's not like it would make any of you stupider than you already are."

The rage flared up again, making Charlie grip the arms of the chair even tighter than before. If she applied much more pressure, the wood would begin to splinter in her hands. But she kept her mouth shut. And her nails away from his face. Jackson seemed to notice her distress, because that smug grin on his face got even larger. "See you in class," he smirked. He walked down the hallway a few steps, but then spun on his heel to face them. "Or, you know, don't. Enjoy the detentions."

The puckered expression on Charlie's face as she watched him go kind of made it look as though she was sucking on lemons. Scratch that, a bag of lemons. A freaking crate of lemons. "That's it," she murmured, glowering at his back as he disappeared down the hall. "I'm putting another squirrel in his locker!"

"Alright, I'm not even going to ask you to clarify that one," Stiles snorted.

"Wait, what do you mean 'another squirrel'?" Scott demanded, looking at her curiously.

"Would you rather I introduced him to Statler and Waldorf?" Charlie barreled on, raising her eyebrows at the two of them and ignoring Scott's 'confused puppy' expression.

"Those old dudes from 'The Muppets'?" Scott asked, his eyebrows furrowing even more than usual. "What do they have to do with anything?"

She lifted her fists in the air pointedly. "Statler. Waldorf."

A loud groan emanated from Stiles's seat. "You named your fists?" he whined. "Seriously? And if you're gonna name your fists, why the hell would you name them after two dudes made of felt?"

"Because," Charlie said seriously. "They are vocal about their opinions and very difficult to appease."

Stiles sighed and rubbed at his eyes in frustration. "Well if those are the criteria I might as well name mine Joan Rivers and Simon Cowell," he muttered back.

"Yes," Charlie said, nodding enthusiastic. "I absolutely think you should do that."

All of the sudden Scott's head appeared in the periphery of her vision, leaning forwards to get a good look at the two of them as they bickered. That wide-eyed expression of horror was enough to completely destroy any sense of wellbeing that she had. "Hey!" he hissed, making the both of them look at him. "This means Isaac's a suspect right?"

Both she and Scott faced Stiles, waiting for his answer. A dark expression flitted across his face and he swallowed heavily. "It's motive," he muttered, scratching at his forehead. "Yeah. They can hold him for this. They _will_ hold him for this."

"What are we going to do know?" Scott hissed. "We're kind of stuck here till further notice."

It was a good question. Honestly she hadn't thought that much ahead. As far as she had gotten was that ploy to get her to the 'nurse's office', and that had pretty much blown up in her face. Shit, this was becoming a very real and present problem. It wasn't like she could link arms with her very own scarecrow and cowardly lion and skip to Oz. They had needed to get themselves into trouble. Now they needed to get out of it. Fast. But just as she was contemplating making a break for it and chasing down Isaac and the cops, the door to the principal's office opened a third time.

"Boys."

That one word sliced through the air and sent a chill down her spine. It wasn't the voice she heard over the intercom when the principal did his morning announcements. She didn't even recognize it, but it held an easy air of authority that made her instinctively wary. And when she turned her head to find the source of that voice, she wasn't disappointed.

Gerard Argent. The last any of them had seen the man, he was cutting somebody in half with a broadsword. And now he was standing in front of them wearing a blazer, a button-down shirt, some slacks, and a creepy smile. Charlie froze like a deer in headlights, unsure of what to say or do. It took a few seconds under that casual yet calculating stare of his to realize that the man still didn't have a clue who she was. Who any of them were. Which meant they were safe for now, but it didn't make the man standing in front of her any less terrifying.

"You're not the principal," Stiles blurted out before any of them had a chance to think up anything remotely useful to say.

"Yes," Gerard murmured, flashing them a smile that made her shiver. "Your former principal, Mr. Whitley, has decided to...pursue a prolonged sabbatical. It was a very sudden decision, and when they needed for someone to fill in, I was more than happy to volunteer my services."

"Uh-huh," Stiles murmured, narrowing his eyes at the man. "I'll bet you were."

Charlie swore inwardly and smacked Stiles in the chest to get him to shut up. Unfortunately that seemed to turn her into the object of Gerard Argent's attention, and she quickly realized that was not a place she liked to be. "Oh," he said, looking down at her curiously. "I was given to understand that I'd only be meeting two students."

Charlie laughed nervously and shrugged her shoulders. "Turns out chemistry class is a breeding ground for delinquency."

The reaction she got was a bit unexpected. Instead of that disapproving glower she had received from Allison's father so many times he chuckled, revealing a threatening set of teeth that were almost too white. "Well the more the merrier," he responded with a knowing smile. "Come on in. Oh, and you might want to bring an extra chair."

None of them moved. It was kind of like one of those bad pranks where somebody puts superglue on the chair and forces you to stay in place. Gerard stood there with that slightly sinister smile and turned the corner into his office again. It was actually a neat little move. He was forcing them to follow him, establishing his dominance in the situation—his ownership of that room. He might smile at them and be inviting, but as far as Charlie was concerned there wasn't a bone in his body that wasn't cold and calculating. The three of them looked back and forth between each other, wondering what the hell they were supposed to do and trying to cope with this cosmic slap in the face. But there was really only one thing to do.

Scott got up first, taking a deep breath before ducking into the office. Letting out a small groan, Charlie got up as well and was about to follow Scott through the door until she realized Stiles hadn't moved from his seat. Frowning to herself, Charlie moved to stand in front of him and raised her eyebrows, the cue that started most of their 'silent conversations'. On this particular occasion those raised eyebrows roughly translated to '_get the hell out of that chair_'. Stiles gave an almost imperceptible shake of the head meaning '_no freaking way_' to which she responded with a narrowing of the eyes.

'_Don't be stubborn_'.

He folded his arms across his chest and jutted out his chin. '_No way_._ Not going to happen._'

She jerked her head in the direction of the door. '_Come on. It's not like this is something we can avoid_.'

He rolled his eyes. '_Ugh. Fine_.'

Grumbling to himself, he got to his feet and grabbed the back of his chair, dragging it along with his feet as they trudged into the office. Both Scott and their new principal were already seated. Mr. Argent looked perfectly serene, but Scott already seemed like he was unraveling a bit—twitching jaw and foot tapping frantically. Charlie cleared her throat and took the empty seat while Stiles pulled the spare one up between her and Scott.

Infinite blackness. That's what Charlie saw when she looked in Grandpa Argent's eyes. Cold, calm, calculating, and empty. Staring into them made her feel hollow, like she could get lost. Charlie shifted in her chair trying to make herself more comfortable, more at ease, but the chair wobbled under her movement. It reminded her of something her dad had told her a long, long time ago—an old trick some of his friends would use if they were interrogating someone. They would shorten one of the legs of the chairs so that the person sitting in it would never be stable, never be settled. That way they could never be comfortable in that seat. It put them on edge so they would crack more easily. And she bet that if she looked at the bottom of one of those chair legs, she would find saw marks.

Looking around the room, Charlie tried to pick apart her surroundings to see if there were any clues that might tell her who exactly she was dealing with. For the most part it looked like your typical principal's office. She had been in enough of them over the years to be able to make that sort of declarative statement. All the usual hallmarks were there—beige walls to repress any sense of creativity among the students, diplomas hung up on the walls, the token stapler. It was exactly as it should be, and totally devoid of clues. It was sterile. Which, now that Charlie thought about it, was a clue in and of itself.

There were no photos. There was no artwork. There was nothing that could even hint to her that the man even had a life outside the four walls of his office. What that told her only served to reinforce what she already suspected. Gerard Argent was a man devoid of sentiment who didn't like to leave a mess. Unfortunately for them, they were the mess he was trying to clean up. He just didn't know it yet.

When the three of them were finally seated, Gerard took a few minutes simply to observe them. He sat in his chair which was slightly higher up than theirs giving him that impression of authority height usually imbued, hands folded on the table, and just stared at them. She knew it was another power play—a way of establishing dominance over them by making them feel uncomfortable—but knowing that didn't stop her chest from constricting. Stiles responded to stress the way he usually did, getting increasingly jumpy and jittery with each passing moment. But at least the two of them were doing better than Scott. He was staring at Mr. Argent with this constipated-looking expression on his face. She wouldn't be surprised if he up and passed out any second.

"Well!" Grandpa Argent finally proclaimed. He clapped his hands together loudly, making the three of them jump in surprise at the noise. His lips twitched slightly at the sights, like he was fighting back a smile. "As you know," he continued, "I am new to Beacon Hills High School, and before we get back to the...unpleasantness of disciplining you three, I think we should try to become better acquainted." He turned to Charlie and smiled widely. It was probably meant to be reassuring, but to her it was more like a predator bearing their teeth. "Ladies first. Now I was informed that I would be receiving two students, Mr.'s McCall and Stilinski—" he tapped his finger on the two files already on his desk for emphasis "—but there was no mention of a young lady. What is your name?"

Having the full force of that man's attention was not an easy thing to cope with. It felt as if he was trying to climb inside her brain and beat against the walls of her skull until he managed to scare up all of her secrets. And she had enough people in her head to begin with, thank you very much. Charlie blinked, trying to reorient herself, and cleared her throat. "Oswin," she answered quickly. "Charlotte Oswin."

Grandpa Argent nodded in understanding before reaching into his pocket and pulling out his keys. The clinked almost impossibly loudly, demanding Charlie's attention, and as she stared at them there were two things that caught her focus—a single silver bullet attached to a chain and a flash drive. She could only see them for about half a second before they disappeared below the desk. Grandpa Argent—man, she was going to have to come up with something better to call him—opened one of his desk drawers and rooted around in it before pulling out yet another file, only this one was considerably thicker than the other two. For some reason Stiles straightened in his seat, craning his neck to get a better look at the stack of papers even though they were still hidden away in the folder. "Is—is that your file?" he asked, shooting her a glance and gesturing wildly at the papers. "_The_ file? The one where all the secrets that make up the inscrutable Charlie Oswin are held?"

The suspicious expression on Stiles's face was replaced by one of ridiculous, child-like glee that didn't seem to fit the situation at all. He kind of looked like a kid who had just been given a juice box and been told to settle in for story time. Letting out a groan, Charlie sank down in her seat and willed herself to disappear right then and there. She could have magical witchy powers, right? Werewolves existed, so it wasn't totally beyond the realm of possibility, was it? But no, she was still very much there and very much visible. Yup. This was going to go just great.

As was expected, a little more than a cursory read was required for their principal to fully appreciate the information that file contained. In fact, she could track his progress through the positioning of his eyebrows. They started of in their normal spot, but then began to move up the forehead incrementally until they almost disappeared into his already receded hairline. Finally, Grandpa Argent flipped the file shut, much to the frustration of Stiles, and looked at her with an expression that was either critical or impressed. Hell, maybe it was both.

"I must say, this is one of the more...colorful files I've had the pleasure of reading," he murmured, shooting her a tight smile.

Charlie exhaled sharply and smiled back in turn. "I had a unique childhood."

"Well I would say so," Grandpa Argent continued, glancing in the file one more time. "Four schools, four cities, six years, all while maintaining virtually perfect grades. That combined with your...transition? It is impressive."

The mention of her father, especially by him, made Charlie clam up a little. She folded her arms across her chest and retreated inwardly, but not enough that she didn't notice Stiles shifting uncomfortably next to her. His eyes darted in her direction to see if she was okay. Grandpa Argent seemed to pick up on the change in the atmosphere because he quickly moved to the next point. "You're a clever girl, that much is clear, but there are some incidences that give me pause."

Charlie scrunched up her face into an elaborate cringe. She knew what was about to come next. A long list of her misdeeds, categorized and color-coded. "Now let's see," he drawled out. "There was the incident where you snuck into school after hours and drew caricatures of all the teachers on their own whiteboards. In Sharpie."

Grandpa Argent turned to Charlie, looking at her expectantly. "You know when Banksy does stuff like that, they call it art."

The man's lip twitched slightly before his eyes flickered down to the file again, making Charlie cover her face with her hands. "You somehow managed to fill your history teacher's car with popped popcorn," he barreled on. "You glued a lawn gnome to your principal's desk. You hijacked the morning announcements to play fifteen minutes of whale sounds. You released a live squirrel in the teacher's lounge. I could go on."

"Y—yes," Stiles stammered, waving a hand in a circle to prompt him to keep going. "Yes. You should absolutely go on. Never stop talking for that matter."

"Wait a second," Scott hissed, staring at her with a wide-eyed expression of awe. "That squirrel thing was real? You actually did that?" Charlie shot him a glare to get him to shut the hell up, but they were way past that now.

"Is there anything you would like to say in response?" Grandpa Argent said, eyeing her carefully.

Charlie opened and closed her mouth a few times, unsure of what to say next. "About that...there's this word 'allegedly'," she said using air quotes. "I'm really fond of it."

"I'm sure you are." He pursed his lips and scanned the file one more time. "There is also the matter of your extracurricular activities," he murmured. "It appears that you aren't involved in any currently, which is off seeing as you pursued a number of them last year. Track team, varsity soccer, academic decathlon, debate team—"

"Whoa, hold on a second!" Stiles interjected. As Grandpa Argent had been going over her list of past accomplishments, his eyes had been getting progressively bigger and more excited. Though when being confronted with Gerard Argent, he ended up looking more pained than anything else. But for some reason the two words 'debate team' broke him. His head snapped up and he looked directly at Charlie. "You were on the _debate team_?!"

"Allegedly," Charlie growled. "I was allegedly on the debate team. You can't prove that."

"I believe you ranked fourth in your age group at the State Championships last year," the elder Argent threw in at the most inconvenient possible time. "Congratulations."

Stiles pressed his lips together firmly, desperately trying to hold back the massive, shit-eating grin that was threatening split across his face. God, the idiot could smile even at the most inappropriate times. Charlie let out a groan and sank even lower in her seat, to the point where she was pretty sure she might just fall out of it. Stiles had started drumming his fingers frantically against the arm rests, like his skin could barely contain his jitteriness. He didn't say anything else, but she could tell that he wasn't about to forget about this any time soon.

Sighing to herself, Charlie faced the white-haired despot head on. "Look, I've been keeping my nose clean since I got here," she mumbled. "No more pranks. I'm now a responsible and fully functional member of society. I'm reformed. You don't have to worry about me anymore. Scout's honor."

"Then why is it that you find yourself in my office for what Mr. Harris described as—" he fished out another piece of paper from the large stack on his desk and grabbed his reading glasses, perching them on the bridge of his nose '—as 'a grievous assault on his person'? A little hyperbolic for a rolled up piece of paper, but I've found that some of the teachers here to have a flair for the dramatic."

"I didn't have anything to do with that," Charlie replied, wrinkling her nose at him and jerking her thumb in the direction of Stiles and Scott. "That was all those two idiots."

Grandpa Argent ignored the accusatory chorus of 'heys!' that emanated from the boys and tapped his finger against his lips thoughtfully. "Then why are you here?"

"I asked to go to the nurse and Harris accused me of trying to ditch," she said simply. "He sent me here."

A weary look crossed Grandpa Argent's face and he took off his glasses all dramatic-like. "I'm going to find this 'Mr. Harris' rather frustrating, aren't I?"

A loud scoff emanated from Stiles's corner of the room. "Not at much as we do," he blurted out.

He came to regret that decision when Grandpa Argent's burning gaze shifted in his direction. Charlie gave an almost audible sigh of relief when she realized that she was no longer the object of the man's scrutiny, but Stiles paled slightly, causing a small pang of regret. Grandpa Argent picked up Charlie's file and placed it back into the drawer next to him before taking a single finger and sliding the other two files across the desk so they rested in front of him.

"Alright let's see here," he drawled out in that impossibly gravelly voice of his. He picked up the first of the two files and peered down at the contents. "Scott McCall. Academically not the most accomplished, but I see you have become quite the star athlete." Charlie leaned forwards, trying to gauge Scott's reaction. He was nodding along passively and refusing to make eye contact. "Mr. Stilinski," he continued. "Oh! Perfect grades, but little to no extracurriculars." He lowered the file raised his eyebrows at Stiles. "Maybe you should try lacrosse."

"He's actually already on the t—" Charlie started to say, but before she could get the full sentence out, Grandpa Argent raised his hand, effectively banishing her capacity to speak.

"Hold on," he said, returning his focus to Scott. "McCall? You're the Scott that was dating my granddaughter.

Scott let out a wheezing breath that kind of made it sound like he had been kicked in the gut. "W—we were dating," he stammered, "b—but not anymore! Not dating. Not seeing any of each other or doing anything w—with each other." He realized the awkwardness of his own wording and squeezed his eyes shut, probably hoping that this was all a dream. When he opened them again the elder Argent was still there, he deflated. "Ugh."

Grandpa Argent was hiding his hand behind his mouth, but the wrinkles forming at the corners of his eyes betrayed the amused smile on his face. "Relax, Scott, you look like you're about to crack a cyanide pill with your teeth."

"It was just a hard breakup," Scott mumbled under his breath.

"Well that's too bad," the man murmured. "You seem like a pretty nice kid to me."

"The nicest," Charlie threw in, nodding dramatically.

Leaning back in his chair, Grandpa Argent surveyed the three of them, pressing the fingers of both hands together in an oddly villain-like pose. "Now listen, guys, yes I am the principal, but I really don't want you to think of me as the enemy."

Stiles gave a bitter snort and raised his eyebrows. "Is that so?" he demanded, his voice oozing sarcasm and shooting Scott a look that clearly read 'do you believe this guy?'.

"However," Grandpa Argent qualified, "this being my first day, I do need to support my teachers. So unfortunately one of you two is going to have to take the fall and stay behind for detention."

It was almost as if they had all coordinated it. All three other sets of eyes turned to Stiles, whose attention was firmly dedicated to picking at his fingernails. When he finally raised his head, he blinked in surprise at all the focus being placed on him. He looked at all their faces in frustration, finally narrowing his eyes at Charlie in a way that clearly said '_et tu, Brute_?'. Charlie pressed her lips together in a thin line and shrugged. '_Take one for the team, dude_.'

Stiles let out a loud scoff and threw his hands in the air in frustration. "Ugh. Fine. I threw the stupid piece of paper at the back of Harris's stupid face." He waved his hands around in a circle. "It was me."

A wide smile split across Gerard's face. "Excellent." He grabbed a pad of yellow paper and scribbled some notes on it in a flowing script that Charlie could barely read before handing it to Stiles. "Mr. Stilinski, you will be reporting to Mr. Harris for detention after classes today."

"Fantastic," Stiles muttered bitterly, shoving the thing in his pocket.

"Alright, gentlemen," Grandpa Argent said, turning to the two boys. "That concludes our business for today."

The two of them jumped to their feet, eager to get the hell out of there, but paused when they realized that Charlie had stayed seated. "What about Charlie?" Scott demanded in confusion.

"Ms. Oswin and I have a few more things to discuss," the man replied. "But the two of you to are free to go."

The two of them stood at the door, unsure of what to do. After a few moments Scott shot Charlie an apologetic wince and wrenched the door open before slipping through it. Stiles, on the other hand, was a little more hesitant. It wasn't until she jerked her head in the direction of the and mouthed the word 'go' that he reached for the doorknob. He slowly pulled the door shut after him, leaving Charlie and Grandpa Argent in the room together.

"Is there, um, it there anything that I can help you with, sir?" she asked lamely.

"Yes," he said with a nod. "You're face was very familiar to me, Ms. Oswin, and I think I know why now. I believe I've seen some photos with you included around my son's home. You're friends with my granddaughter, correct?"

"Um, yeah," Charlie muttered, avoiding all eye contact. "Allison and I are friends."

"Good," he replied with a reassuring smile. "I've only recently reentered Allison's life, and I want to be certain that she is well situated, so I do take particular interest in her friends and the people she chooses to associate with."

It was like somebody had jabbed a needle into her vein and shot pure, distilled, unadulterated panic into her system, setting her nerve endings on fire. She wasn't sure why, but this man terrified her. More even than Peter did. There was a...hollowness to him that filled her with dread, and under his scrutiny was not a place she wanted to be. "Am I under investigation or something?"

A throaty chuckle filled the room. "No, not at all," he replied, waving his hand dismissively. "I just want to take some time to get to know you. Now, I look at a file like yours and it tells me something. You've got all the elements of a leader thrown in here, but all the signs of delinquency as well."

"It's like I said," Charlie repeated. "I've kept my nose clean since I've gotten here."

"Yes you have, more or less," Grandpa Argent agreed. "Though you have been a part of some of the more...curious incidents that have transpired. But the way things stand now, it appears that you've reached an impasse." He leaned forwards, fixing her under his stern gaze. "What I'm trying to say, Ms. Oswin, is that it appears you have an extraordinary amount of potential. It just needs to be shaped. Molded. And I should hate to see it wasted. So you have a decision to make. Are you going to be the leader or the misfit?"

It was a question Charlie had been asked before. Multiple times. This wasn't the first occasion where a teacher or authority figure had sat her down, had a conversation about her 'behavioral issues' and discussed what would happen if she cleaned up her act. But something felt a bit different about this time. She felt like she was being recruited. Not in the sense that the man in front of her was going to take her under his wing and tell her all about the magical world of werewolves and werewolf hunting, but recruited in the sense that he was trying to plant a seed in her mind. Something that he could possibly and exploit later on, if need be, by establishing a line of trust. Gerard Argent was a fan of the long con. There was one problem with that. Charlie didn't like being put in a box, especially by people who thought they knew her.

"Neither," she answered. "I don't want to be the leader—that's never been appealing to me. And I don't have nearly enough gravitas to get people to actually follow me. I hold no illusions about that fact. I'm going to be the person standing next to the leader making snarky commentary and making sure they don't screw everything up."

Grandpa Argent narrowed his eyes at her curiously. "Well, that is an interesting perspective."

Charlie made a face and shrugged. "I know my own mind."

"Yes, I can see that," he replied. He studied her in silence a few more moments before speaking again. "I'll tell you what. Why don't you and your aunt join my family and me for dinner sometime? That way we can get to know each other under less...official circumstances."

Charlie swallowed heavily, but forced herself to nod in agreement. "Sure. That sounds...lovely." Clearing her throat, she smiled at him awkwardly. "Soooooo, about the whole 'intent to ditch' thing—"

"Oh, I'm sure Mr. Harris was just over-reacting," Grandpa Argent sighed. "You're free to go visit the nurse now. And if I find a lawn gnome glued to my desk, I'll know where to look first."

Chuckling uncomfortably and breathing out a quick 'thank you', Charlie jumped out of her chair like it was on fire and scrambled towards the door. She should probably have gone for the cool, calm, unworried approach, but she was way too eager to get out of there. She had just spent the last fifteen minutes in a cage with a lion. As soon as he decided to go on the attack, that was it. Charlie practically exploded through the door, breathing a sigh of relief, but that sigh soon turned into a shout as she came face-to-face with a pair of big, light brown eyes blocking her path. The surprise made her jump. "Son of a—Stiles!" she hissed, smacking him in the chest. "What the hell was that?! Are you trying to give me a freaking heart attack?!"

He let out a defensive scoff and planted his hands on his hips, bobbing his head in her direction. "Well, sue me for wanting to make sure you were okay!" he hissed back. Charlie took a deep breath and ran her hands down her face, willing her heart rate to back to normal. All of the sudden Stiles grabbed her arm and directed her further away from the principal's office. "Well?" Stiles prompted. "Are you?"

"Am I what?" Charlie asked stupidly.

"Okay," he reiterated. "Are you okay? I tried to listen in but that guy's voice is so insanely low."

"Oh," Charlie murmured. "Yeah. Yeah, I'm fine. He just...told me I had potential and invited me over to dinner."

Stiles's face scrunched up into a disbelieving and highly perturbed expression. "Okay, one," he said, lifting a finger. "That's super-weird. Two—" he lifted a second finger "—there's no way you're going to that dinner."

Charlie let out a huff and shoved her hands deep in the pockets of her jacket. "If you've got a way to avoid it without alarm bells going off, I'm all ears."

Stiles's mouth fell open and stared absently at the ceiling, racking his brain for ideas. It was a few moments before he swore under his breath. "Nope," he muttered, scratching at the back of his neck. "I got nothing."

"Exactly."

Stiles swore under his breath and wiped at his eyes in frustration before looking around and realizing that they were both standing in a very vacant hallway. "We should probably get back to class. If I give Harris a chance to give me another detention, he's definitely going to take it."

Nodding agreement, Charlie followed them as they wound through the hallways, moving in the general direction of the chemistry room. Neither of them showed any desire to get there quickly. As they walked, Charlie noticed Stiles shooting her more than a few sidelong glances, and they were increasing in frequency. He was making that face—the one where he was really, really trying not to blurt something out and killing himself in the process. "Out with it," Charlie sighed. "Before your brain explodes."

"You were seriously on the _debate team_?" he exclaimed, suddenly sounding oddly giddy. "The debate team? Really?"

"Yes, Stiles," Charlie drawled out, kicking absently at a set of lockers next to her. "I was on the debate team."

"The debate team?" he repeated looking at her pointedly. "You?"

"Yeah," she said, rolling her eyes at him. "Is it surprising to you that I can form clear, concise, and articulate arguments? I think I'm starting to get offended, Stiles."

"No," he said, shaking his head. "You can definitely do all of those things. But, I don't think you're allowed to hit people when you're on the debate team and I know from lots and lots of painful, traumatizing personal experiences that that's how you win most of your arguments." Charlie let out a scandalized scoff and hit Stiles in the shoulder, only this time instead of the typical strangled yowl, it was a cry of victory. He dodged in front of her, blocking the path, and pointed at her emphatically. "See! That's definitely not sanctioned!" He tried to fight back the grimace, but soon enough his face was screwing up into an expression of pain. "Gah! I'll never understand how you can hit so hard with those tiny little arms!"

"Practice," she said, brushing by him primly.

"No, hold on a second," Stiles said, catching up with her. "I don't think we've talked nearly enough about this whole debate championships thing. Firstly, and obviously most importantly, is there a video?"

"Wow would you look at that!" Charlie proclaimed, spinning around and gesturing to the door next to her like Vanna White giving away a vacation package. "We're back at chemistry class. Looks like that question's not gonna get an answer."

"Ugh, boo," Stiles whined, looking back and forth between her and the door. They could already hear the muffled sound of Harris's harsh, bitter voice through the walls. He sighed heavily and frowned down at his watch. "I guess we've only got ten minutes. He can't torture us that much, right?"

"Me?" Charlie said, pointing to herself and blinking innocently. "I'm going to the nurse. Haven't you heard?" She let out a lame, wheezing cough and frowned at him. "I'm sick."

Stiles narrowed his eyes and let his jaw hang open, shaking his head at her. "It's moments like this when I can't decide whether you're awesome or I hate you."

Charlie shot him a smug smile and shrugged her shoulders. "I guess it's one of life's many mysteries." With that, she spun on her heel and began marching down the hallway.

"Enjoy the cramps!" Stiles shouted after her.

"Enjoy the detention!" she shouted back.

She continued to walk down the hallway, but as she got further from the chemistry room, something made her slow down. There was some weight attached to her, forcing her to slow until she stopped. A feeling compelled her to look over her shoulder, and when she did, Stiles was still standing by the door, watching her go. He twitched slightly in surprise when she looked at him, but quickly recovered, smiling and giving her a thumbs up, both of which Charlie returned. And then, with one last nod, he disappeared into the class room.

Crap. Feelings were stupid. Epically stupid. Charlie liked things that made sense, and feelings...they didn't make any sense. Being around Stiles simultaneously made her happy and was a giant pain in the ass. Life was so much easier when she didn't have to bother with them in the first place. It was so much less complicated. But at the same time she couldn't imagine it any other way. There was just this...empty feeling in the pit of her stomach. Like she was missing something, but wasn't sure how to get it. Jesus, she wasn't about to start trying to express herself through poetry, was she? Because that would be her equivalent of hitting rock bottom. No. No moping. Or sulking. Charlie Oswin didn't sulk. She coped. One foot in front of the other, one day at a time, and all those other clichés.

A quick trip to the nurse's office was made and she downed a few Advil to cover all her bases, but after she was done, Charlie didn't head back to chemistry class. No, instead she found herself standing outside the door to the French room, waiting for the bell to ring. They were all chess pieces on a board, moving and responding to threats as they arose, and it was time to make the opening moves. When the bell finally did ring, she watched as the students rushed out, waiting for one particular student with long, brown hair.

"Charlie?" Allison demanded in confusion as she came face-to-face with her friend. "What are you doing here?"

Charlie grabbed her arm and pulled her aside, leveling her with a serious look. "I know you probably still hate me, but we have work to do."

Allison's spine straightened and her jaw jutted out with determination. "What's next?"


	8. Phone Tag

**Disclaimer: 'Teen Wolf' isn't mine. Shocking, right? But it's true. If there are any similarities in content or dialogue, it has probably originated with the show.**

**A huge thank you to katiesgotagun, Daenerys86, masqueraderose3, cateslikescats, Iwannabelikeme, Valkyrie101, TheMMMG, nixevee, Whatsgoingon, Atomicity, Shes-The-Proto-Type, FreckleFacedFrieda, SimplyKelly, Kate, Gee Brittany, Montanasmith5897, HeeHeeHee01, Bookiee, AlexMelRose, ForgeandGred4Ever, Guest 1, Tania, Hanna, Just Anonymous, swanqueen4, ThunderSpeak, Undeniable Weirdness, Guest 2, Smiles in the Shadows, Female Whovian, Jayjay329, TWsos12345, ellosaurus, Chibisemo, Aoibhinn, The City of Books, 99Tina99, XXxbellxXXxx, Guest 3, and Hollystyles for reviewing. You guys are the best! And, of course, to the inspiration that is BrittWitt16. I would also like to give a HUGE thank you to The City of Books who made a comic-book style cover for this story! It is just too cool to handle. I need to conquer my internet illiteracy and upload it to the web so I can make a link to it on my profile. And that thank you is also directed to missss supernatural who made me some incredible banners. Your creativity never ceases to amaze. You guys spoil me so much!**

**OH MY GOD THIS CHAPTER WAS A LOGISTICAL NIGHTMARE! I love Teen Wolf—the fact that I have dedicated almost half a million words to it should be enough to make that clear—but the show sucks at establishing time lines. Like, they show you the order things happen in, but give no context of how long it's been. Anyways, this was what I could do with it, and I hope it turned out well. Not sure how it ended up, but hopefully it's enjoyable.**

Chapter 8 – Phone Tag

Well this was a giant mountain of suck. It didn't make any sense that she ended up here. There was so much going on, so much to do in so little time. With each second that passed, it got darker, casting dark shadows under the fluorescent streetlamps, and the moon rose higher and higher in the sky, like some looming celestial countdown. And where were they all while they listened to the ticking clock? Everybody else was placed in precarious positions. Isaac was now firmly planted in lock-up at the sheriff's station, where none of them could get to him. Not yet, at least. Scott had gone with Derek to the Lahey household to scare up any clues he could find that might tell them something about who or what killed Lahey senior. At this point Allison was sneaking around her house, trying to amass as much information as she could as to what the Argents—what Gerard—would be planning. Stiles was probably the worst off out of all of them, stuck in a room with nobody but Harris for company for upwards of an hour. And while all of them were off doing vital and necessary things, what was she left doing? Absolutely freaking nothing.

Phone duty. That's what she had gotten stuck with. What with the whole 'star-crossed lovers' thing going on Allison and Scott couldn't directly contact each other anymore, which meant that they needed a go between. Turns out she got that privilege. And what did that mean for her? A whole lot of waiting, that's what it meant. It meant her sitting on the hood of her car in the school parking lot, staring at her cell phone and generally cursing her existence. Why did she have to get stuck with the boring stuff? Hell, she could probably watch reruns of '_Supernatural_' while doing it. But she didn't. She had one job to do and she was going to give it all of her attention. Which meant she was equal parts riddled with anxiety and mind-numbingly bored. And according to her watch, what felt like hours had only been twenty minutes.

Waiting. Ugh. It was the absolute worst. And it wasn't something Charlie was used to. That was the thing about being an independent-minded person who floated from town to town without a care in the world. She did what she wanted to do when she wanted to do it. There was nobody to wait for. And now she felt like it was happening all the time. She could probably start a whole internal monologue about how being made to wait was part of the human condition and it demonstrated the interdependence necessary for functional relationships, and blah, blah, blah, blah. At least she had death-glared Scott into agreeing to call her as soon as he found anything potentially important. Or anything mildly interesting. Or anything boring. Basically she had extracted a promise to call her no matter what on pain of...something. She hadn't quite decided what it was yet.

As if the universe was trying to add insult to injury, Charlie found herself sitting on the hood of the car in the parking lot of the school. It wasn't like anybody had forced her to stay there—she could play dispatch from anywhere else in the continental U.S., but she didn't have anywhere else to go. Plus Stiles was still in there, and she knew full well that neither of them could hack it on their own. They might be the two in the group who 'figured it out', but that didn't mean they didn't need help, and these days they wound up being each other's backup more often than not. Or maybe that was just a rationalization. Still, for whatever reason, she was seated on that cool, smooth surface with her phone sitting next to her and waiting for the inevitable chaos to ensue.

All of the sudden the phone started buzzing violently next to her, rattling against the metal to the car. Charlie jumped in surprise and began to berate herself. She had one job to do, and she didn't even bother remembering to take the thing off vibrate? That was a new low. She grabbed the phone, fumbling with it nervously until she managed to flip it over and get a good look at the name flashing across the screen. And once she did, it wasn't the name she had expected. Had her phone been on, she wouldn't be listening to Duran Duran's 'Hungry Like The Wolf'. She would have heard 'Girls Just Wanna Have Fun'.

Taking a deep, steadying breath, Charlie steeled herself to what she might be hearing on the other side of the phone. She winced slightly as she brought the phone to her ear. "Hey, Lydia!" she said in a voice that was slightly higher pitched than normal. "How's it going?"

"Charlie." That was all she said. And the word came out tight and focused, like Lydia was actively trying not to yell or cry or something. Charlie had been on the receiving end of that voice many times, and it never ended well.

"What's up?" Charlie asked again. The exhausted sigh she received in response did not bode well for the direction this conversation would be taking. Charlie's mind automatically jumped to all of the worst possible options. Lydia was panicking, Lydia was hurt, Jackson had said something stupid to her and Charlie would be forced to release two squirrels in his locker. But then Lydia cleared her throat in that superior-sounding tone and that tension that had stretched her like a rubber band relaxed. This wasn't that type of phone call. It was a 'let's scold Charlie' phone call.

"Alright," Lydia continued, moderating her tone very carefully. "Under normal circumstances I would totally dismiss this as ridiculous gossip that has gotten blown way, way out of proportion, but since it's you, I know I have to ask." She sighed again, and Charlie could almost hear the eye roll from the other side of the line. "Charlie, did you just get up in front of a class and say that you had to go to the nurse because quote, 'You had cramps that hurt so bad you thought your uterus was about to burst out of your body like in the move 'Aliens'?"

"What—no," Charlie replied. "No. But I totally should have. That's way better than how I said it. It involves good use of imagery and pop culture references. Who's said that?"

"EVERYBODY!" Lydia shrieked into the phone, forcing Charlie to yank the phone away from her ear lest the shrill tone blow out the tympanic membrane. "Everybody is saying that!"

"Oh, come on," Charlie muttered with a roll of her eyes. "You've got to be exaggerating."

"I am not exaggerating!" Lydia hissed back. "Unless you've forgotten, Charlie, we live in a day of social media! If one person knows it, everybody does! At least four people posted it to Twitter!"

"Huh," Charlie murmured, making a face. "Wow. People really need to get a life."

"Oh my God," Lydia whined. "Being friends with you is like a giant, perpetual facepalm."

Charlie let out a loud huff of protest. "Hey! That's hurtful!"

Lydia let out a tiny screech of frustration, followed by a calming breath. "Charlie," she continued, trying very hard to keep herself composed. "Look, Charlie. I just went on naked walkabout. Allison's aunt turned out to be some crazy serial killer. By some completely and utterly ridiculous twist of events, you just became the most normal out of the three of us."

"Oh, God," Charlie said, wincing slightly. "That's a scary thought."

"Exactly," Lydia reasoned. "Which is why I am begging you to just...be normal. Or at least nomal-ish. Because having you act all crazy just makes us look even crazier. Now I never thought I'd have to say this to anybody over the age of like six, but we don't talk about our menzies in public. And we definitely don't announce them to a crowded room!"

"Okay, Lydia," Charlie replied in an appeasing tone. "I promise to never discuss my menzies in public ever, ever again."

There was a short pause on the other side of the line. "Okay," Lydia bit out carefully. "That's...good. But it's also not what I asked you to do."

"Yes it is," Charlie protested.

"No it's not."

"It sounds like it is."

"But it isn't."

"So you want me to discuss my menzies in public?"

"No! Of course I don't!"

Charlie clucked and shook her head. "Okay, I'm getting some seriously mixed messages here."

"I want you to promise that you'll be normal-ish!" Lydia hissed back.

"Oh," Charlie drawled out. "Yeah, about that. Lydia, I love you and everything—you know that—but I can't do that."

"Wha—why not?!" Lydia shouted.

"Because I have this rule where I don't make promises I'm not sure I can keep," she replied. "And we are both painfully aware that there is a very small chance that I will successfully be normal-ish. I can't help it."

"Oh my God!" Lydia groaned into the phone. "Why do I continue to put up with you?"

"Because you love me," Charlie chirped back. Lydia grumbled into the receiver, but was interrupted by a loud beep. She pulled the phone away from her ear and peered down at the screen. Scott's name was flashing across it in big, bold letters, accompanied by a picture of a sad-looking puppy. Shit. It was the moment of truth. Sucking in a deep breath, she put the phone back up to her ear. "Lydia, I'm getting another call. I need to go tell them I've taken my Midol and everything is going to be just fine."

Charlie expected to have to pull her phone away from her head again as Lydia shrieked at her in the face of what was obvious sarcasm, but the moment didn't come. Instead there was a resigned sigh. That sent alarm bells ringing all over the place. Something was wrong. "Lydia, it's going to be okay," Charlie assured her vehemently. "You're going to be okay."

"Really?" Lydia chirped, forcing her voice to be bright and sarcastic. "And how exactly would you know that?"

"Because you're the strongest person I know," Charlie answered seriously, refusing to buy into the façade she was trying to build up. "Because screw everybody. You're Lydia Martin. On your worst day, you're better than the rest of them put together. And you're an idiot if you ever let anybody—even Jackson—make you question that for even a millisecond."

Lydia didn't respond to that. All she got was a dead silence. That is until her phone beeped again, reminding her that she was getting another call. Charlie swore under her breath and rubbed at her eyes in frustration. "Look, Lydia, I'm so sorry, but I've got to go. Talk later?"

"Y—yeah," Lydia muttered, her voice a little thicker than usual. She cleared her throat, and the hesitant tone was replaced by a firm one. "Yeah, sure. Talk later."

Minutes earlier, Charlie would have been more than happy to punch that button on her phone and talk to Scott, but now that she did, she felt an overwhelming sensation of regret. Guilt. Any other night she would have driven straight over to Lydia's with a pint of ice cream and throw herself on the grenade by suggesting they watch 'The Notebook' yet again, but right now she couldn't. She had work to do. And Lydia would always end up being the collateral damage.

"Hey," she murmured tiredly into the receiver as she answered the other call.

"Are—are you alright?" Scott asked in confusion.

"'Course I am," Charlie replied immediately. "Why?"

"I—I don't know," Scott mumbled back. "You just sounded a bit off."

"You know me, Scott," Charlie sighed. "I'm always okay." A short silence persisted between the two of them, like neither of them could really think of anything to say. It was kind of weird, actually. She knew Scott really well—better than pretty much everybody but Stiles, Allison, and his mom—and they were perfectly good friends, but that was when everybody else was there. When it was just the two of them in a conversation, they still didn't quite know how to react to each other or what to talk about. Luckily enough, they didn't have a shortage of topics today. "So?" she prompted, raising her eyebrows. "Are you there yet? What's happening?"

"R—right," Scott stammered out. "Right. I just got to Isaac's house. Well...has Allison called yet?"

Charlie let out an internal groan and rolled her eyes. Of course that was his first question. "No," Charlie snapped, trying hard but failing to keep the bitterness out of her voice. "No, your lady-love has not called yet. I will be calling you the second she does as per the previously agreed upon plan. As soon as I know anything, you'll know it too."

"Good," Scott said through a relieved sigh. "That's good."

Charlie wasn't sure why, but that relief kind of pissed her off. Everybody had something to do, and hers was just waiting for a phone call. She hopped off the hood of the car, wrapped the arm not propping up her phone around her waist, and began pacing back and forth angrily. "Okay, can I just express to you one more time that this sucks to an epic degree? I might not be able to spontaneously grow claws or whatever, but I do have something to offer, and I've basically been turned into a glorified secretary for Team Werewolf. Everybody else is running around and being James Bond, and I'm stuck playing Miss Moneypenny. If I'm anything, I'm M. And I don't feel like M right now." She stopped pacing and ground her teeth together. "I am not Miss Moneypenny, Scott. I need something worthwhile to do. I need to kick a little ass, especially with the week I've had."

"Who—who is Miss Moneypenny?" Scott asked in confusion. "Is she a friend of yours or something?"

"Miss Moneypenny? Classic James Bond?" she prompted. "Seriously? Nothing? You have no point of reference for this? None at all?" When all she got in response was a confused silence, Charlie's hand involuntarily flew to her forehead, hitting it with a resounding slap. Sometimes she could swear that the two of them didn't speak the same language. Charlie opened and closed her mouth a few times, genuinely at a loss. This was probably why they didn't talk that often just the two of them. They might be good friends, but they really didn't have all that much in common, and she hadn't grown up with him like Stiles. But she liked him—he was a good person, one of the best—and they cared about the same people. That was more than enough.

"Wow," a harsher, more gravelly voice said from somewhere off in the distance. "You actually got her to stop talking. That's new. And honestly kind of refreshing."

Charlie's eyebrows drew together in a frown, glaring at nothing in particular, and kicked at the wheel of her car. "Scott, do me a favor and tell Derek to suck it."

The awkwardness of the next few seconds was so palpable, Charlie could feel it through the phone. "Yeah..." Scott drawled out, apprehension filling his voice. "I'm pretty sure he already heard you. And he doesn't look very happy."

"He never looks happy," Charlie pointed out. "I could give him a free car and he'd be making the exact same facial expression. I'm starting to wonder if it's actually broodiness or if he's had himself Botox-ed and the smile muscles are no longer functional."

"I'm pretty sure he heard that too," Scott mumbled. "And the 'rage' muscles in his face are working just fine."

"Okay," Charlie nodded, snapping the conversation out of that completely useless tangent. Sighing heavily, she scratched at her forehead and all of the sudden she realized why she had been rambling on and on about nothing in particular for so long. It was because it was time to ask the question—the one she wanted to ask but was fairly certain she didn't want to hear the answer to. "So, um, so what did you find? In Isaac's house? Any—any evidence, or—"

"Nothing yet," another lower and more gravelly voice proclaimed from somewhere in the distance. "Scott hasn't found anything because we just got here and since then you've been talking and wasting time. Like usual."

Scott made some nondescript noise of agreement, a noise which was immediately followed by the sound of loud heavy footsteps approaching. "Give me the phone," Derek growled. "Give it. Now." Scott made a few more sounds of protest, but after a few moments, a distinctly Derek-like voice was speaking directly into the receiver. "We all want to do something, but we need a freaking plan first! What do the Argents know? What are they planning? How are we going to get into the police station? These are all questions we don't have the answer to it. We can't come up with any sort of plan until we know what we're going to have to deal with. And we're going to need that idiot Stiles to get into the police station! So why don't you do the job that was given to you, and we'll figure it out when we actually can."

Charlie opened her mouth to respond, but snapped in shut again in the face of the loud click and dial tone that confronted her. Turns out Derek's phone etiquette was just as bad as his in-person etiquette. But he wasn't wrong. They needed to have all the information in before they swan dived into a course of action. They were trying to break a guy out of a building filled with people filled with guns. That did require at least some basic planning. Which meant that she needed that call from Allison. Which meant that she was stuck waiting for a phone call. Again.

Hopping back up onto the hood of the car, Charlie stared back up at the moon. It was almost impossibly huge. According to all those articles Stiles had sent her, the effects of the full moon would be growing throughout the night, reaching their culmination in—she checked her watch for the time—about three more hours. That meant they had three hours to cobble together as much information as they could, or Isaac was going to start growing an alarming amount of facial hair in front of a room full of deputies.

An eternity passed between that moment and her next phone call. Charlie had been sitting there staring at the blank screen, she practically fell off her car when it let up and began buzzing in her hands, this time with Allison's name on it. The thing didn't even have a chance to finish that first ring before she had hit the send button and pressed it to her ear. "Hey," she said breathlessly. "What's going on?"

"God, I'm so sorry it took me so long to call you," Allison muttered. She was speaking in a low tone and her voice was shaking slightly as well. Not a good sign. "I—I wanted to call you earlier, but then my dad and Gerard called me into this room to talk and—and I couldn't get away."

"That's fine," Charlie replied as calmly as possible. "You're here now. What did they want?"

"Lydia," Allison breathed out.

It was like somebody had hit her over the head with a mallet. Her hand tightened around the phone to the point where she thought it might break apart in her hand. "Wh—what do you mean they wanted Lydia?" she hissed. "They're not going after her too, are they? I mean, they can't! I—I just talked to her and she's fine! Well not totally fine but—I mean she's not turning or anything and—"

"No, no, no, no," Allison said urgently, trying to calm her down. "They're not going after her. Not yet anyway. I think—I think they're just trying to figure out what happened to her. They asked a bunch of questions about what happened the night of the dance. How she was bitten, how she got to the hospital, what happened when she disappeared that night...your name came up."

"Me?" Charlie demanded, her eyebrows drawing together in confusion. "What do I have to do with anything? Your dad didn't—"

"No, my dad didn't out you," Allison replied. "But you're the one who found Lydia after her 'fugue state' thing. She was bitten, but she's not turning. That...apparently that just doesn't happen. My dad never liked not knowing something. Gerard likes it even less."

Shit. This was very, very not good. Charlie swore under her breath and rubbed at her forehead to stave off the panic-induced migraine that was threatening to form. And that hypothetical dinner Grandpa Argent had proposed was getting more and more awkward by the second. It wasn't a nicety or an act of politeness. No, she was going to be vetted. But that wasn't important right now. They needed to take things one crisis at a time. And today's crisis was Isaac. "Alright," Charlie murmured. "Alright, we're going to have to put all this Lydia stuff on the backburner for now because we've got—" she checked her watch "—shit, we've got barely more than an hour before the shit hits the fan in the most epically huge way possible."

"We might have even less than that," Allison murmured ominously.

"What?" Charlie demanded, the overwhelming sensation of anxiety building getting bigger by the second. "What the hell does that mean?"

Before she got her answer, the doors to the school were thrown open and Stiles practically exploded through them and began marching through the parking lot. Charlie waved frantically, catching his attention. When he saw her, he looked up at the sky and sighed with relief, grateful to have someone there who might be able to tell him what was going on. "Hold on a second," Charlie said into the phone. "Stiles just got out of detention—I'm going to put you on speaker."

Charlie clambered off her car and the two of them practically jogged in each other's direction. "Hey!" Stiles shouted as he approached, waving his hands around angrily. "Sorry! Harris literally just let me out of detention. Literally. And he had my phone the whole freaking time!"

"It's fine," she said shaking her head dismissively as she skidded to a halt next to him. "I've got Allison on the phone now." She activated the speaker function on her phone. "Allison, you there?"

"Yeah," Allison's robotic-sounding voice replied. "I'm here. Look, guys, we've got to do something right now."

"Okay," Charlie nodded. She and Stiles huddled around the phone, with Charlie staring directly at him as she spoke. "Okay, tell Stiles what you just told me."

Allison blew out a shaky breath before continuing. "They were asking me all these questions about Lydia and how she was bitten by Peter. They sent this guy out—"

"Wait, what guy?" Stiles interrupted, his eyes widening as he looked at Charlie.

"He was dressed as a sheriff's deputy," Allison elaborated.

Charlie's and Stiles's expressions both darkened visibly. It didn't take a genius to know where this was going, and it wasn't anywhere good. "That means they've already made their move," Charlie murmured.

"Yeah," Stiles agreed. "They're sending him to the station for Isaac."

"We need to get there as soon as possible," Charlie muttered.

"Wait, guys," Allison's disembodied voice insisted. "There's—there's something else."

"What?" Charlie and Stiles demanded in unison.

"He was carrying this box with something on it," she continued. "Like, um, like a carving or something."

"What was it?" Stiles asked seriously.

"Hold on, hold on," Allison mumbled quietly. "It's in one of these books." Charlie stared up at the sky and began to bounce up and down on the balls of her feet as she listened to the sound of rustling papers. It took a lot of energy, but she somehow managed to suppress the urge to shout 'hurry it up already!' at the top of her lungs. Then she felt a pressure on her shoulder. Stiles's hand. Her eyes snapped down to his and he fixed her with a determined stare, nodding reassuringly. Charlie exhaled sharply and stopped bouncing on her feet before nodding back. Then he let his hand slip from her shoulder. She kind of wished he had left it there.

"Okay," Allison finally said. "I found it. I'm taking a picture." There was the sound of a shutter going off, followed a few seconds later by a beep indicating that she had received a message. Charlie quickly opened up the message, and as soon as the photo popped up she swore heavily. All of the air rushed out of her lungs, like she had been kicked in the stomach.

"Did you get it?" Allison demanded.

Charlie glanced down at the picture again. It just looked so innocuous—a pretty flower with deep purple petals projecting outwards from the stalk. It was something that she would doodle in the corner of a notebook. But no, at this point a pretty little flower had to go and become way, way more sinister.

"Yeah," Stiles answered for her. "Yeah, we got it."

"And?" Allison pressed. "What is it?"

"It's aconite," Charlie muttered.

"Aconite?"

"Wolfsbane," Stiles elaborated. "It's wolfsbane."

"And what does that mean?" Allison prompted.

Charlie and Stiles exchanged a serious look before he spoke again. "It means they're going to kill him," Stiles replied.

"Kill him?!" Allison hissed into the phone, forcing her voice to stay low enough to keep anyone else from hearing. "That flower thing is going to kill him?!"

"Yeah," Stiles nodded. "Derek got shot with a bullet laced with a tiny bit of the stuff and he stared leaking this black liquid stuff from pretty much every orifice. It was—" he shuddered at the memory "—it was seriously gross. I almost had to chop off his arm."

"Okay," Charlie whispered, pinching at the bridge of her nose. "Okay, this just got incredibly real. Alright, bottom line is we can't let that guy get to Isaac. Allison, how long ago did he leave?"

"I—I don't know," she stammered. "I heard a car leaving the driveway while Gerard and my dad were asking me all those questions and I called you as soon as I could get away from them. I'm going to say...ten minutes? Maybe less?"

"Do you think you can catch up to him?" Stiles asked urgently.

"Maybe," she said. "I think so."

"Can you slow him down," Charlie piled on.

Allison stayed silent for a moment. Charlie could picture her drawing herself to her full height and jutting out her chin in determination. When she spoke again, her voice was filled with resolve. "If I can catch up to him, I can slow him down."

Stiles exhaled loudly and made a face at the phone. "G—good!" he stammered out. "Great! Fantastic! Do that then!"

"Well what are you guys going to do?" Allison asked.

Charlie and Stiles exchanged another look. "We're going to go to the police station and head him off," Charlie answered for the both of them.

"That's it?" Allison whispered anxiously. "Charlie, that's not much of a plan?"

"We'll figure something out," Charlie replied. "We always do. Let's agree to call if anything changes."

Allison's hesitation was obvious, but soon enough she let out a resigned sigh. "Okay," she acquiesced. "But call me."

"Sure thing," Charlie replied quickly. "Bye." She went to hang up the phone, but before she could Allison made one more noise of protest. "What is it?" Charlie asked.

"Nothing," Allison mumbled under her breath. "It's just...Charlie, I miss you too."

As soon as she spoke the words, Allison hung up, leaving Charlie gaping down at the phone and listening to a dial tone. The abruptness of the goodbye left Charlie reeling, and for the first time in a long time it wasn't from sheer, unadulterated panic. Something good had just happened. Allison had just forgiven her, or at least was starting to forgive her. The ice was beginning to thaw. She exhaled sharply and her lips twitched up at the corners almost forming a smile. When she looked up at Stiles, he was staring at her with raised eyebrows and 'I told you so' written all over his face. It didn't need to be, though, seeing as he then proceeded to say it out loud.

"What did I tell you?" he said, smirking at her. "I told you there was no way she wouldn't end up missing you like crazy."

Charlie rolled her eyes heavily and elbowed him in the side. "Shut up," she mumbled. "We've got work to do."

Stiles huffed loudly and folded rolled his eyes in turn. "Though now I'm beginning to wonder why she would," he muttered bitterly.

Ignoring him, Charlie scanned the parking lot until her eyes fell on two of the very last cars there—Stiles's Jeep and her Impala. Her eyes darted back and forth between them a few times before she came to her decision. "Too many people recognize my car," she muttered. "If it shows up in the parking lot of the sheriff's station for no particular reason, people are going to start asking questions. Your dad especially."

"We can take my Jeep," he nodded in agreement. The two of them moved towards the Jeep, him fishing his keys out of his backpack and her scrolling through the 'recent calls' list on her phone. When they got to the car, they both wrenched open the doors and slid into their respective seats, almost completely in unison. When the doors closed, only one slam was heard. Stiles quickly shoved the keys into the ignition and twisted them, making the engine roar to life. "Alright," he said, turning to her. "First things first. We need to—"

"I'm already calling Scott," she muttered, hitting the 'send' button.

"O—okay, then," Stiles said, bobbing his head and glancing at her out of the corner of his eye. "Same page."

Charlie put the phone on speaker one more time and held it out on the palm of her hand so they both could hear. It rang about three times before there was that telltale click of the connection being made. But the voice on the other side was low, harsh, and distinctly un-Scott-like.

"About freaking time."

Stiles responded the way he usually did when Derek reared his head. He groaned loudly and rolled his eyes. "Come on!" he shouted angrily. "You've got to be freaking kidding me! Seriously? Why the hell are you using Scott's phone? Y—you know what, no! Okay? I don't care. Just give him back the phone now. Right now."

The crackling silence that was received in response probably signified a refusal. Charlie sighed heavily and rubbed at her forehead to stave off the headache. "Hey, Derek," she muttered. "Stiles got out of detention."

"Yeah," the voice snapped. "I can see that."

"Would you kindly permit us to speak with Scott," she drawled out sarcastically. "We're kind of dealing with some time sensitive shit right now."

"Scott's not in a position to be helping anybody right now," Derek replied, the level of frustration in his voice mounting by the second.

Stiles let out a spluttering scoff and glared at the phone like he was trying to set it, and by association Derek, on fire. "Uh, excuse me?" he spluttered loudly. "Wh—what the hell is that supposed to mean? Is it physically impossible for you to not be cryptic? Let me talk to Scott! Now!"

"We're dealing with...'time sensitive shit'," Derek growled. "We'll deal with it now."

Stiles's head snapped around and he stared at her with his usual 'do you believe this guy?' expression, making her sigh heavily. Being the mediator was giving her a migraine. She was used to being the unreasonable one. Charlie squeezed her eyes shut and prayed silently that everybody would play nice. "Derek," she said in her scolding tone. "Give Scott the phone. Now. Pretty please."

There was a short pause accompanied by a low growl, but soon enough Derek uttered a word—just one word. And she could tell that it was a word that he hated.

"Fine."

"Wh—how the hell did you get him to do that?" Stiles protested. "He never listens to me."

"Because I'm prettier," Charlie answered sarcastically.

Charlie was fairly sure she heard Stiles mutter the word 'narcissist' under his breath, but she opted to ignore it. Instead the two of them listened to the garbled noises of a phone changing hands. Stiles rolled his eyes and grumbled a bitter 'you've got to be kidding me' as the sound droned on for an extended period of time, but then those noises were replaced by the sound of something much more troubling—heavy breathing. Not that type of staggered, gulping breaths that come at the end of a long run or those quick, uneven ones that signify an oncoming panic attack. No, these were deep and steady, but labored. They were the breaths of someone fighting to maintain control.

All of the sudden the noise inside the car got really quiet, leaving Stiles and Charlie with only the wind outside the car and the sound of the breathing. In that moment, something in Stiles changed. All of that hostility towards Derek drained away and was replaced by something else. Charlie knew grief enough to know what it was. It was the type of pain you felt when you knew someone you loved was in pain—when your family was in pain. And all formal titles aside, Scott was Stiles's brother.

Feeling her eyes on him, Stiles glanced over at Charlie a few times, but couldn't maintain eye contact for more than about half a second. He cleared his throat and his jaw twitched before he managed to make himself speak. "Hey, buddy," he said in as even a tone as he could muster. "How's it going?"

"Never better," Scott replied, a hint of a smirk working its way into his tense voice. "I feel—" he sucked in a heavy breath "—totally awesome."

"Yeah, you sound awesome," Stiles mumbled back. "The kind of awesome you feel like after being punched in the stomach about sixteen times."

"Sounds about right," Scott chuckled. But then the chuckling stopped. Charlie could feel the darkening of the conversation. "So about the police station tonight. Sorry, man, but I don't think I'm gonna make it there."

"That's cool," Stiles said with a forced shrug. "We don't need your ass getting the rest of us into trouble anyway. We got this man."

"You sure?" Scott asked, sounding supremely guilty.

"Am I s—? Yeah, I'm freaking sure," Stiles said in that usual indignant way of his. "Go take a nap or something. Sleep it off." And then the indignation faded away. Stiles started tapping his thumb against the steering wheel and his head sagged on his shoulders. "Listen...take care of yourself, man," he murmured in a low tone.

"Yeah," Scott murmured back. "Yeah. You too."

At that point, Charlie had to look out the window. It was physically impossible for her not to. She knew that she wasn't supposed to be there for this—that conversation was not hers to hear. She was an intruder into a deeply personal moment, but as hard as she tried, she couldn't shut off her ears. So she decided to pretend she wasn't there, instead opting to stare out the window. Pressing her forehead against the cool glass, she squinted into the dark. They were flying past the trees so quickly, she couldn't make herself focus on one, and as she tried her eyes began to ache. And then, every so often she would see something else. A set of eyes peaking out from the brush. Normally it would have been just a small flash of yellow, but now it was as if someone was lighting a torch and waving it directly in her eyes.

Soon enough Stiles and Scott had said their goodbyes and Derek had the phone again, his distinctively pissed off voice jolting her back to attention. "That was touching," he grumbled. "Can we get on with it please?"

Charlie rolled her eyes at his tone. "Derek, before you start making colorful commentary, I want you to run through the sentence in your head and ask yourself, 'is this productive?'"

"And what we're doing right now?" Derek shot back. "Is this productive?"

"Okay, look," Stiles interjected. He scrunched up his face, gagging on the next couple of words like they left a really bad taste in his mouth. "Derek, you're gonna have to meet us at the police station. Like right now."

"Fine," Derek acquiesced. "There's still over a half hour till Isaac will be forced to shift. Stiles can get us to the holding cell and—"

"We don't have more than a half hour," Charlie interrupted. "It's more like twenty minutes. If that."

"What the hell is that supposed to mean!" Derek shouted. The sound of it was so loud Charlie could feel her phone vibrate in her hand from the noise.

"We talked to Allison," Charlie continued. "The Argents are making a play."

The response she got was an exceptionally loud crashing noise. "Son of a bitch!" Derek shouted at the top of his lungs. "I knew something like this was going to happen!"

"How?" Stiles demanded. "And for that matter, how do the Argents even know about Isaac in the first place? You turn one teenager and a couple of days later he's locked in a police station with hunters about to wolfsbane him to death. Not a great trial run. You might kinda suck at this whole alpha thing."

In the silence that followed, Charlie thought she might die. That she might just drop down dead from the sheer force of Derek's anger. "The door to Lahey's car was torn off," he spat. "There were claw marks. Isaac was arrested for it. The Argents drew their own conclusions."

"Ripped off?" Charlie demanded, her mouth dropping open in disbelief. "Okay, what is capable of that?"

"I don't know," Derek shot back. "But it wasn't Isaac." There was a loud sigh of disapproval. "Look," Derek continued, "we need to get there sooner rather than later. Scott might be keeping himself together pretty well, but Isaac won't be. And if this 'true love' crap isn't keeping Scott from shifting, imagine what's going to happen to Isaac. I'll meet you guys at the police station. And hurry the hell up."

"Wha—no," Stiles protested. "No. You parking that car at the sheriff's station is gonna send up red flags all over the place, for the cops and for the Argents." Again, his face contorted into an expression of distaste. "We're gonna have to pick you up."

"You're coming from the school!" Derek shouted. "Do you have any idea how far out of your way you'd have to go to get here?!"

"Well then we'll meet somewhere," Stiles reasoned. "Believe me, I like it even less than you do."

"Okay, how about we all play nice here," Charlie jumped in, trying to calm everybody down before the tension went spiraling out of control. "It's a fantastic opportunity for team-building. Derek, there's a gas station two blocks away from the station. Park there and we'll pick you up. How does that sound? Good? Good. That's what we're doing. Be there in ten minutes or less."

With that, she promptly hung up the phone, preventing any more potential protests. Once again, silence reigned in the car. And it sucked. With all the hurried conversations and panic attacks and general freak outs, Charlie though that she would appreciate a bit of silence so she could take a breath and prepare herself for the complete crapshoot that was to follow. But the quiet didn't make it better. It made it so, so much worse. Because as it turned out, her mind didn't know how to be peaceful. It just went into overdrive, obsessing about all those facts that she didn't know or those things she couldn't control. And it kept wandering back to one question. If she went to Isaac's house, what the hell would she find?

The door to Mr. Lahey's had been pried off. Pried off. As far at the police were concerned, Isaac was just your average, human teenager. He couldn't have done something like that. Not even if it was one high adrenaline situations where mothers lifted cars off of their infants. It was impossible. And Jackson's little speech about seeing Isaac leave the house was hardly definitive. Which meant that whatever was inside that house—it was really bad. And if she was being honest, even with their half-assed plan, she didn't see a way out of this. Breaking a werewolf out of lockup before he got axe-murdered by an assassin was something that required a whole-assed plan. And they didn't have the time to come up with one.

Charlie sucked in a deep breath and held it. She drew her legs up to her chest so that her heels were perched on the edge of the seat and wrapped her arms around them, curling herself into a little ball. She was a porcupine. Anything that came at her was not going to get past that prickly exterior and would probably get a face full of quills. Well, except for that one person.

"What are you thinking about?"

The words broke Charlie out of her swirling vortex of unproductive thoughts. She blinked and glanced out of the corner of her eye to find Stiles studying her profile. Clearing her throat, she reached up and tucked some flyaway hairs behind her ears. "What, um, what do you mean?"

"What are you thinking about?" he reiterated.

"Nothing," she answered a little too quickly.

"Okay, that's bullshit," Stiles drawled out, rolling his eyes at her. "First of all, you're never not thinking about something. And second of all, you've got your 'thinking face' on."

"I don't have a 'thinking face,'" Charlie mumbled, wrapping her arms back around her legs.

"No, you have a lot of 'thinking faces'," Stiles shot back. "There's the one where you're coming up with devastatingly sarcastic things to say, there's one when you're mentally setting someone on fire for being an idiot, there's one when you have a problem you need to solve, there's one where you're wondering what the cafeteria is serving for lunch—"

"I get it," Charlie said, cutting him off. "It's like your 'is today Wednesday or Thursday?' face."

Stiles shot her a bemused look. "I have a—"

"Yes, you do," Charlie barreled on. "And dude, it's always Wednesday. Every time. Whenever you ask that question it's like you're actively trying to disappoint yourself."

Stiles's eyebrows furrowed in an expression of intense concentration. "Oh my God, you're right," he said, staring at the road in front of him with a dazed look. "It is always Wednesday, isn't it?" But then he groaned and shook his head in frustration. "You know what? No. Just no. You're not gonna distract me. You're wearing your 'I'm thinking about deep and troubling things' face on. So either you start sharing with the class, or I'm gonna annoy the hell out of you until you do. I can do it—I know how."

"Yes, Stiles," she murmured. "I am fully aware of how much of a pain in the ass you can be."

"Thank you!" Stiles shouted. "And?"

Charlie blew out a long breath and let her forehead hit her knees. How the hell did he know her so well? How was that even possible? All of that crap about her being an 'enigma wrapped in a mystery' or however the hell he put it was just that: crap. He could read her like a freaking book. Except when it came to some things—things she was grateful he couldn't quite decode. If he could things would have gotten really awkward really quickly.

Stiles began to poke her in the shoulder, literally prodding her into talking. "Okay, fine!" she grumbled. "Fine, okay, I'll talk!" She squeezed her eyes shut and ran her hands down her face. When she dropped them back down again, she looked over at the boy sitting next to her. "We can do this, right?" she whispered urgently. "I mean really, can we? The deck is stacked against us so much of the time...I don't know." She uncurled from that tight little ball and sank lower in her seat. "Sometimes I just feel like that kid who ties a towel around their shoulders, says it's a cape, and then jumps off the roof because they're convinced they can fly."

Stiles shot her a curious look. "It feels like there's a story there," he mused casually.

Charlie pursed her lips and shrugged her shoulders casually. "No. No story. Just a hairline fracture of the ulna."

Stiles let out a snort and made a face at her. "You broke your arm?"

"Nope," Charlie said, popping the 'p'. "Neighbor kid."

"Huh," Stiles muttered, staring back at the road in front of him. "I find that oddly disappointing."

"That I didn't break my arm?" Charlie said drolly. "You find the fact that I didn't break my arm disappointing?"

Stiles opened and closed his mouth a few times before jerking his head to the side noncommittally. "Well it sounds bad when you say it like that."

"Like what?" she said, raising her eyebrows at him. "Out loud? Look, Stiles, the point is that kid was a hopeful idiot who screwed everything up. I don't want to be that kid. That kid ate glue."

Stiles blew out a long breath and began drumming his fingers against the steering wheel of the car. "Well I don't know about you but I've never eaten glue, so I'm gonna go ahead and settle in on a nice, resounding 'no'."

"You know what I mean," she said, studying his profile. "I'm not saying that we don't try—I'm never going to say that. Ever. I...I guess I'm just scared that one day we're going to throw ourselves into something and my best...it's just not going to be good enough. What if I screw something up and instead of helping I end up getting somebody hurt? What if I end up getting somebody killed? It almost happened with Lydia, and—"

"Hey," Stiles interrupted. His voice was harsh, almost like he was mad at her or something. "Hey, that—that was not your fault. You can't put that on yourself—that was Peter. If you tell me that you've been blaming yourself for that then I will personally keep yelling at you until you stop it."

"How exactly would you yelling at me make me feel better?" she said giving him a weird look.

"It wouldn't," he growled, glowering at the road ahead of him. "But it would definitely make me feel better about you being a total idiot."

"I don't blame myself for Lydia," she pronounced, even though it wasn't entirely true.

"Okay!" Stiles practically shouted, glaring at her with wide eyes. "G—good!"

The two of them faced forwards, staring out through the windshield. The headlights of the car cut through the darkness, lighting their way, but it only gave them a couple of yards. After that it was giant wall of black. Charlie couldn't help but see the whole thing as a bit of a metaphor. They literally had no idea what they were driving into.

"Look," Stiles muttered, breaking the silence for a second time, "look, yeah, sure, there might be one day when, you know, we don't pull a miracle out of our collective asses, but if you think you could ever, _ever_...I don't know—let any of us down somehow...You're freaking crazy, okay? Like out of your mind insane. I mean, you remember that time in the school when we were getting chased around by the alpha?"

Charlie shifted uncomfortably in her seat. "Yeah, Stiles," she murmured. "I don't think I'm likely to forget that one any time soon."

"Yeah, well we got separated, and I was freaking the hell out okay?" he said. His hands gripping the steering wheel a little tighter before he continued. "He could have killed you or maimed you or...you know what, I'd rather not think about those options right now so I'm just gonna move on. Anyways, the point is I was running through all these scenarios in my head and you—" He let out a tiny, disbelieving laugh and glanced at her out of the corner of his eye. "You go and show up again, perfectly fine, with a flame thrower. A flame thrower, by the way, that you made out of hairspray and a lighter. I mean, who does that? You're like a mini MacGyver, saving the world with silly string and duct tape. If I had to pick anybody to sit in that seat next to me right now and drive off to save some teenage werewolf, it would be you."

Charlie bit her lip and sank a little lower in her seat. "Thanks."

"Actually it would probably be Scott," he amended, bobbing his head as he thought out loud.

"Okay, then," Charlie mumbled. She actually kind of felt a bit offended by that.

"But only because of the superhuman strength thing," Stiles barreled on, like he needed to justify himself in some way. "That's the only reason. But then again he's been sidelined by the whole 'time of the month' thing. So you. Yeah, definitely you. So no, you're not that kid on the roof. Screw that kid on the roof. Screw—" He shot her a questioning glance.

"Adam Hornstock," she supplied.

"Yeah!" he exclaimed, pounding his hand hard against the steering wheel. "Screw Adam Hornstock! Because if you jump of a freaking roof, you're gonna fly." He narrowed his eyes and cocked his head to the side like he was reconsidering his words. "Or, okay, you know at the very least not break your arm."

"Okay."

"Sorry, I didn't quite hear that," he grumbled.

"I said 'okay'," she repeated, louder and drawling out the words in frustration.

Stiles did a small fist pump and nodded, looking oddly proud of himself. Charlie, though, couldn't demonstrate the same degree of unbridled enthusiasm. That whole speech thing that he had just made—it cause her stomach to twist up and do a small somersault, but at the same time that warmth she usually felt was soon replaced by a chill. The faith that Stiles inexplicably had in her made her feel simultaneously better and worse. To know that he believed in her—that meant more than she could possibly express. But it also meant that she could disappoint him. Badly. And the most mind-boggling thing about it was that even if she did disappoint him, he would forgive and forget and trust her all over again. Charlie wished she could believe in people like that. And through him, she kind of did.

"Stiles, do you remember that time I told you that you were the bravest person I know?" she muttered. Charlie honestly couldn't say what his immediate reaction was. She was too busy inspecting her fingernails where her hands lay in her lap. It was a few moments before Stiles responded.

"Pshah," he said with a dismissive snort. "You'll have to be more specific. People tell me stuff like that all the time."

Charlie finally looked up at him, her face arranged in a quizzical expression. "Oh, do they?"

"Um, yeah," he said, nodding at her. "Yeah, they do."

"Really?"

"At least once, and usually—"

"I'm sure."

"—usually twice. Three times if it's been a good day."

"What's the most number of times in a day that people have said that to you in one day?" she asked, smirking at him.

Stiles scrunched up his face into a confused expression. "Don't know..." he murmured. "I wanna say twenty—twenty-seven? No that can't be right. That's way too low."

Charlie bit her lip and narrowed her eyes in mock contemplation. "One hundred and twenty-seven?" she proposed hesitantly.

Stiles snapped his fingers and pointed at her, nodding in agreement. "That's it. That's the one."

"Right," she chuckled. But that chuckle soon faded away. Instead she pressed her lips together in a thin, genuine smile and put all humor aside. "It's still true," she said. "Probably more so now than then."

In the next few moments, it occurred to Charlie that Stiles should probably be paying more attention to how he was driving. There were a lot more side glances and curious looks than there probably should be from someone hurtling down a road in the middle of the night at speeds that were considerably higher than those suggested by the signs they kept passing. But they were usually just that—glances. Now she felt his eyes on her for a good, long while. And it made her feel like she wanted to jump out of her skin. Or at least out of the car.

"We need to call Allison," she said suddenly.

Stiles opened and closed his mouth a few times, searching for the right words, but he couldn't seem to find them. He snapped his mouth shut and let out a snort that almost sounded bitter. "Right," Stiles murmured under his breath. "That's exactly what we need to be doing at this exact moment in time."

There was an odd tone in his voice that she couldn't quite place. But she didn't have the time to dwell. Charlie frowned to herself, and pulled out her phone for what felt like the hundredth time that night. After punching in the right contact, she set her phone on 'speaker' and let it ring.

"Hello?"

As soon as the word reached her ears, Charlie furrowed her eyebrows. Like Stiles, Allison had an odd tone in her voice too. In her last call Allison had sounded anxious—worried. This time she sounded exhilarated. "Allison?" Charlie asked urgently. "Are you okay?"

"Yeah," Allison replied, again sounding oddly self-satisfied. "Yeah I'm fine."

"Did you find the guy?" Charlie barreled on.

Allison exhaled sharply into the receiver. "Yeah. Yeah, I found him. He was driving a police cruiser."

"And?" Stiles continued impatiently. "So did you slow him down?"

"You could say that," Allison replied.

Charlie really didn't appreciate the coy tone and limited information she was being provided with, but she could deal with it for the present. As long as they got just a little bit more time. "Okay," she said, nodding along with her words. "Okay, well we're on our way to the station now."

"Where's Scott?" Allison asked.

"At Isaac's," Stiles answered shortly.

"Does he have a plan?"

"Yeah, but not a very good one," Stiles grumbled. "And unfortunately we don't have the time to come up with anything better."

At that point all the vital information had been conveyed. Charlie sensed the conversation coming to its natural conclusion, but she had one more thing to add. Though it was likely that nobody involved would be happy with what she had to say. "Allison, I don't think you should go to Isaac's."

There was a very long, very tense pause that followed. "Why not?"

"He's—he's _shifting_," she insisted. "You haven't seen in—not on a full moon. The end result...it's not good. He might have more control, but there are no guarantees. Scott might not be Scott when you get there. It's not safe."

The reply came back quickly, with no thought at all. Like there was no thought needed. "Scott's not going to hurt me," Allison said evenly.

Charlie had to repress the instinctive and angsty eye roll and pinched at the bridge of her nose. "Allison, this whole 'love conquers all' thing is very sweet and very noble but—"

"Scott isn't going to hurt me," she repeated, making sure to enunciate every word carefully. "Look, you and Stiles...just take care of yourselves, okay?"

And then there was a loud click. Charlie could just wish that everything turned out well now. She hoped that Scott was okay-that he would be himself-and that Allison would stay safe. But she couldn't do anything about it now. Now her mind could only be filled with that one objective. That click might at well have been the gunshot at the start of a race. Under three minutes later, the Jeep pulled up at the aforementioned gas station. It was a bit anticlimactic, really. Their little adventure was beginning at a 7-Eleven. But that weird sensation of disappointment was almost immediately wiped away—obliterated—when she saw that gleaming black Camero and the leather-jacket clad, scowling, broody werewolf leaning against it. Crap. It was go-time. The Jeep's axles squeaked slightly as it rolled to a stop. Derek pushed himself up off his own car, and slowly walked back towards them. It was almost like he was trying to be dramatic.

"Okay," Stiles sighed, nodding to himself. "We are so ready for this." He looked over at Charlie, as if he was seeking some sort of confirmation. She tried to smile encouragingly, but she was afraid it looked more like a grimace. Or liked she had just smelled something really, really bad. Whatever face she ended up making, it didn't seem to be all that comforting because Stiles collapsed back in his seat and ran a hand down his face. "Okay," he said, straightening up as soon as his posture had slackened. "We can do this. And if anything goes wrong, we'll just shove Derek in front of us and run away screaming. How does that sound?"

Charlie shrugged. There was no way in hell they could come up with anything better now. So she was committing. Whole-heartedly.

"That sounds like a solid plan that I am totally on board with."

The game is on.

**CHAPTER 8 SOUNDTRACK**

**Charlie waits for a phone call. Any phone call.**

**~-~-~-~-~-~No Power - Absofacto**

**The car ride. Stiles and Charlie talk.**

**~-~-~-~-~-~Under Water - Real Magic**

**Arriving at the gas station and gearing up for the 'game'.**

**~-~-~-~-~-~Break/Hands - Cameras**

**Comments are always appreciated! In fact, I encourage them.**

**Oh, and in other news a couple of songs I used for the 'Black Water Soundtrack' popped up on a couple of CW shows this week! TVD used 'Kids' by The New Division and Reign used 'Hollow Talk' by The Choir of Young Believers. I picked them out over a month ago! I'm trying to get into the music supervision business. Maybe this means I'd be good at it! Hope you like the sound selection.**

**I guess 'The game is on' could be considered a Sherlock reference!**


	9. The Last Minute

**Disclaimer: 'Teen Wolf' isn't mine. Shocking, right? But it's true. If there are any similarities in content or dialogue, it has probably originated with the show.**

**A huge thank you to katiesgotagun, TheMMMG, herongraystairs, Guest 1, revolutionfanatic, nessafly, lionessXofXdreams, Guest 2, Guest 3, Guest 4, Smiles in the Shadows, bagginsoftheshire666, Atomicity, heroherondaletotheresuce, Bookiee, Devon Laurel, Sonny13, ssstilinski, Ayine, Daenerys86, SimplyKelly, Gee Brittany, SK-Scatenato, Kate, Liv, Guest 5, Tania, BriancyyD, swanqueen4, My mother is a koala, taytayfanatical, pennamethathasn'tbeentaken, ForgeandGred4Ever, Little Bucky, terri, Guest 6, Micaela M, Guest 7, Just Anonymous, Female whovian, Undeniable Weirdness, Valkyrie101, YelloSubmarine93, TWsos12345, Emma, Aurora Abbot, zvc56, Stilinski's Heart, carlie-the-dreamer, onethousandmoths, smkbaby123, Guest 8, Aobhinn, and The City of Books for reviewing! I appreciate it so much.**

Chapter 9 – The Last Minute

Well this was a terrible idea.

No. No she couldn't say that. For it to be a terrible idea there had to be an actual idea in the first place. As it stood now, there was no idea. There was no plan—no _real _plan anyway. On its own, that fact didn't bother Charlie all that. Over the past couple of months, she had gotten more than used to the whole 'flying by the seat of her pants while hoping she didn't screw up horribly and die' mentality. And so far it had worked out great. But this time, pulling up in a parking lot filled with police cruisers next to a building filled with guys in khaki uniforms carrying loaded guns, the uncertainty she usually felt carried a bit more weight than usual.

Get the key from Stiles's dad's office and get Isaac out of the holding cells. That was it. That was all they were going on. No mention of how they were going to go about it, just a general to do list—a few boxes that needed to be checked off.

The brakes of the Jeep squeaked loudly as the car pulled to a stop, making Charlie sigh heavily. There was no more time to spend trying to come up with ideas. She leaned forwards in her seat in the back, sticking her head between the other two residents of the car. She half-expected Derek to shove her back into her seat like he had the last time they were in this position, but this time he allowed her to stay in place. "Okay," she muttered. "So where do we go from here? How are we gonna do this? I mean, I'm guessing your dad doesn't keep the keys to the cells in his desk drawer."

"The keys to every cell are in a password-protected lockbox in my father's office," Stiles explained.

"And that's not going to be a problem?" Charlie asked, frowning at him.

Stiles gave her a sheepish look and shrugged. "I may or may not have come across it under some dubious circumst—You know what, that doesn't matter. That's not gonna be a problem. The problem is getting past the front desk."

Stiles inclined his head towards the building, making Charlie and Derek follow his gaze. Through the window and open blinds they saw a woman wearing the typical khaki garb of a sheriff's deputy and making herself a cup of coffee. Overall she didn't look too intimidating or strict, but then again there were always mitigating circumstances when it came this sort of thing. "Stiles," Charlie drawled out curiously, "how well does that woman know you?"

A strange grumbling noise issued from Stiles's mouth and his head sagged a bit. "Well enough."

"Well enough to know that you shouldn't be left to wander about a sheriff's station unsupervised, you mean?" Charlie prompted, smirking slightly.

Stiles's head snapped back up and he turned around to look at her with an expression that was certainly not appreciative. "Yeah, Charlie," he barked. "You might say that."

"Okay!" Derek said loudly, interrupting their bickering. "Is she the only one who we have to worry about?"

"Yeah," Stiles said, glaring at Charlie for a moment before turning back to Derek. "Everybody else is out on patrol or off-duty."

Derek stared at the woman as she picked up her newly poured cup of coffee and moved back to the front desk. "Alright," he said with a definitive nod. "I'll distract her."

Derek made a move to reach for the door handle, but before he could Stiles grabbed his shoulder. "Whoa, whoa, whoa—you?" Stiles stammered out. "You're not going in there."

As soon as Stiles's hand made contact, Derek went rigid. Well, more rigid than usual, and that was saying something. He twisted slowly around in his seat, the fabric of his leather jacket squeaking menacingly as he turned, and he stared at Stiles. It wasn't even threatening. It was simply surprised. He looked back and forth between Stiles and his hand a few times. Stiles followed the gaze to his hand and swallowed heavily, his eyes going wide. "I—I'm taking my hand off."

"Derek, you do remember that you were a fugitive like two weeks ago, right?" Charlie pointed out.

It was her turn to be on the receiving end of Derek's glare. "I was exonerated."

"You're still a person of interest!" Stiles spluttered.

"An innocent person!" Derek protested.

"An—? You?!" Stiles said through a bitter and disbelieving laugh. "Yeah! Right!" Derek, though, didn't seem to share Stiles's amusement. He stared at Stiles evenly, causing Stiles to roll his eyes in the now well-honed 'why me?' expression. "Okay, fine," he grumbled bitterly. "What's your plan?"

Derek made a face at him and raised his eyebrows. "To distract her," he drawled out slowly, like he was talking to a small child.

"Uh huh, how?" Stiles snapped back in a hostile tone. "By punching her in the face?" Stiles pulled his lips back, baring his teeth in what was probably meant to be a snarl and made some weird grunting noise, making Charlie roll her eyes.

"By talking to her," Derek amended, looking at Stiles like he was an idiot. Not that that differed much from his baseline facial expression.

"Okay," Stiles said, bobbing his head along with his words. "Alright. Give me a sample. What're you gonna open with?" Derek just sighed and swung his head around to look out the window one more time before raising his eyebrows at Stiles. Stiles opened and closed his mouth a few times, narrowing his eyes at Derek. "Dead silence," he murmured incredulously. "That should work beautifully. Any other ideas?"

The corners of Derek's lips twitched downwards into a contemplative frown and he shrugged his shoulders. "I'm thinking about punching you in the face."

"Because that would be productive," Charlie interjected with a roll of her eyes. "Look, Stiles, Derek doesn't actually have to _say_ anything. He'll be speaking the language of dimples and cheekbones."

Stiles and Derek both turned around to look at her at the same time, Stiles with a confused expression and Derek with a pissed of one. Well, more pissed off than usual. "What the hell are you talking about?" Stiles demanded.

Charlie groaned internally and allowed her head to fall forward, colliding with the seat divider. It was almost like Stiles was actively trying not to understand what Derek was talking about.

"He's going to flirt with her, obviously," Charlie said, jerking her head in Derek's direction. She ignored the odd gagging noise Stiles made and turned to Derek, smirking widely. "What would a robot flirting look like?" she mused to herself. "You could talk all binary to her. I'll be the 0 to your 1, baby. What do you say, Big D?"

Stiles gave a loud, mildly disgusted groan while Derek's eyes narrowed into slits as he glared at her. Charlie narrowed her eyes as well, but hers was a questioning look. "I'm taking that as a no?" Cue more glaring. "You know, Derek, if you look at her like that, I don't think your plan is going to work all that well."

"Get out of the car."

Charlie shrugged and inclined her in the direction of the door. "You're kinda blocking my exit, dude."

Derek's jaw twitched violently, but he didn't respond. Not verbally at least. Sparing two more seconds for glaring at her, he reached for the door handle a second time, this time wrenching the door open. Stiles winced at the sound of the door hinges grating. "Don't—"

Before he had the chance to finish his thought the door slammed shut with an impossibly loud bang, making the wince deepen even further. "Stop abusing my car!" Stiles shouted after him. "Everybody needs to start respecting the wheels!"

Shooting him a sympathetic smile, Charlie clambered over the seat divider, almost doing a back flip as she collapsed into Derek's newly vacated seat. She pressed her lips together in a thin line and looked at her reflection. In her eyes she could see uncertainty—that spark of hesitation—and plenty of fear. But that was okay. That was reasonable. Fear was a natural, evolutionary response—it was that sensation that told you something was a bad idea. Bravery was looking that emotion in the face and saying screw it. Which was why bravery often went hand in hand with stupidity.

Screw it.

"Suck it up, Oswin," she muttered under her breath.

At the soft sound of her voice, Stiles's head snapped around to look at her. "Hm?"

"Hm?" Charlie repeated, looking at him as well. Stiles's light brown eyes stared at her expectantly. Charlie made a face and shook her head. "Nothing. Let's go."

"But—!"

Before Stiles could get the next words Charlie opened the passenger-side door as well, following Derek out of the car. Stiles swore and mumbled something to himself, but exited the car as well. He sidled up next to Charlie and the three of them formed some sort of bizarre, pre-game huddle. Apparently Derek was acting as their self-appointed quarterback, squaring his shoulders in their direction and fixing them with a stern glare. "This is how it's going to happen," he growled. "I'll go in and you two idiots can sneak in a minute later."

"Huh," Stiles laughed out, rolling his eyes so dramatically his head rolled back a little bit too. "Really, buddy?" He let out a scoff and smacked Derek in the shoulder—a gesture which was not appreciated. "I mean, come on. A minute? Dontcha think you're getting a little big for your britches there, champ."

Charlie swore she could almost see the rage building behind his eyes, like a fuel gauge going up. When it hit maximum capacity she was pretty sure Derek would explode, but it stopped just short. His jaw twitched violently before he spoke. "Wait one minute. Sneak in behind me."

Without any further elaboration Derek made a move to brush past them, but Charlie took a step to the left, blocking his path. Derek froze in place with that same rigid posture, and slowly directed his gaze so he was glaring directly into her eyes, his own spitting fire. "Get out of my way."

"No," Charlie replied simply.

"No?!" Derek spat, staring at her with wide eyes.

"No," Charlie repeated, keeping her voice even. "Not until you tell me what was in Isaac's house."

A low, rumbling noise issued from Derek's throat, like he was growling at her. Yup, he was really, actually growling at her right now. "We do not have time for this."

Charlie stood firm, folding her arms across her chest and jutting her chin in his direction. "Which is exactly why I'm asking you right now," she shot back. "Because right now is the only time there's enough at stake that you might tell me the truth. Lying takes longer. It takes more thought." Derek narrowed his eyes at her even further, and she mimicked him. "I'm not the one slowing us down right now," she murmured. "You are."

Their standoff felt like one in those old-timey Western movies. There would be camera jump-cuts between their steely glares, a distant eagle screech would echo in her ears, and, hell, she might as well throw in a tumbleweed. And what happened in mere moments could feel like it went on for hours. Derek seemed to be judging all the possible outcomes of the situation to see which was the most expedient. Soon enough he came to the correct conclusion—that her ability to annoy the hell out of him would be a much bigger interruption to their plan than the two seconds it would take to explain. Yes, Charlie won the standoff, but as soon as she did, she kind of felt like she lost.

The way Charlie saw it, everybody had a baseline facial expression. She knew what hers looked like—a weird expression of slightly sarcastic amusement if that made any sense. Lydia, on the other hand, she looked perpetually dissatisfied. As if the world wasn't trying hard enough to be interesting to her. Now Derek, his face was always...unpleasant. Everything was unpleasant. Decaying corpses—unpleasant. Psycho uncles—unpleasant. Sunshine—unpleasant. Laughter—unpleasant. Joy—unpleasant. But the expression on his face now, the expression on his face when he began to talk about Isaac, it wasn't just unpleasantness that she saw. It was pity. And maybe even a little regret.

"His dad locked him in a freezer," Derek said bluntly. "He drilled some air holes in the thing and locked him in a freezer. For hours sometimes. You can see the fingernail marks where he tried to claw his way out."

Hearing that was kind of like somebody had taken a baseball bat to her stomach. And her face. And every other part of her. Charlie wasn't sure what she had expected Derek to say. She had known it would be bad, but she had never expected it would be...that. Her breath caught in her throat when she tried to speak again, making the words come out haltingly. "A freezer," she managed to force out in a pathetic whisper.

"Yeah," Derek growled. "A freezer. So maybe we should get him out of the small, box-like cell before the full moon reaches its peak and he loses control. Does that sound like a good idea to you?"

Charlie didn't have an answer to that. Any answer would have been bullshit. All she could do was nothing. She just stood there in shock, like someone had just hit her over the head. In the face of her silence, Derek rolled his eyes and brushed past her. He didn't violently knock his shoulder into hers like he might have done a few weeks ago, but he did ensure that his arm hit hers, like he was making a point. But even then she just stood there, trying to reconcile everything in her brain.

As Stiles passed Charlie by, he grabbed her shoulder and turned her around, leading her towards the sheriff's station. "L—look," he said, sounding more than a little bit rattled himself. "You didn't know. Nobody did."

"Jackson did," she muttered bitterly.

"Yeah, but he's a dick," Stiles replied as if that explained something. "But look, there's nothing you could have done okay?"

Charlie stopped short just before the steps leading up to the station and turned to face Stiles. "Yeah, Stiles!" she hissed. "That's the problem! Nobody knew! How alone does somebody have to be for something like this to keep happening?! For years!"

As she spoke, Stiles's face screwed up into a pained expression. "Okay," he said, grabbing her by the shoulders. "Okay. We can't hop in a time machine and fix everything. That technology is still like twenty years out. But we're helping him now. That's the best we can do. That's all anybody can do."

Charlie exhaled sharply and nodded to herself, staring at her shoes. She couldn't look at his face. "I know," she murmured. "It—it just sucks. A lot."

The hands grasping her loosened slightly and began to brush up and down, rubbing her shoulders comfortingly. Her stomach clenched even more, but she took a deep breath, forcing herself to be steady. When she managed to raise her gaze again, Stiles was looking at her with a hesitant expression. Like he really, really wanted to say something else that would make it better, and was kicking himself for not being able to come up with it. Charlie nodded at him reassuringly and the corner of his lips twitched slightly, like he almost wanted to smile. But that smile was almost immediately replaced by an expression of concern. He twisted his head around and stared at the entrance to the sheriff's office.

"Crap," Stiles whined, glaring at the door. "Derek's been in there unsupervised for like thirty seconds." He glanced over at her, a wince etched into the lines of his face. "Do you think he's punched her yet?" Charlie stared at him with a blank face for about two seconds before she betrayed the seriousness of the situation with a loud snort. She rolled her eyes and ran up the stairs, leaving Stiles behind her. "Hey!" he yelled as he jogged after her. "That was a legitimate question!"

The two of them collided with the front door, shoving it open violently, but tiptoed as they moved through the entryway in the direction of the main office. Through some miracle they managed to stay quiet enough to hear the supremely uncomfortable conversation taking place. The two of them stopped just short of the next se of doors leading to the main desk. And then they heard the voice. The voice that couldn't possibly belong to the person they both knew it belonged to.

"Uh, I had a question," the voice said. "Uh, I'm a little thrown. I really wasn't expecting someone ..."

"Like me?" a flattered female voice finished.

At that, Charlie actually, physically had to gag. Sticking her tongue out at the words was a physiological response. But she couldn't help herself from peeking around the corner in the direction of the main desk. Call it covering the bases, or at the very least 'morbid curiosity', but she had to look. And as soon as she saw it, she couldn't look away. It was like seeing a gruesome car accident—you want to stop looking at it, but for some reason you physically can't shift your gaze.

"Seriously?" Stiles groaned from right behind her. "Ugh, gross." Charlie hissed at him to be quiet and smacked him in the shoulder.

"Well I was going to say incredibly beautiful," Derek continued, forcing Charlie to roll her eyes.

At that point, the woman was pretty much blind to everything except for the six foot piece of man-meat standing in front of her. Charlie finally wrenched her eyes away from the scene and looked at Stiles. She silently jerked her head past the desk and he nodded in agreement. Crouching down, they slipped into the room and scurried past the desk. They managed to make it around without being noticed, but as they began walking down the hallway directing then to the sheriff's office, Charlie happened to look over her shoulder. And what she saw made her stop short.

Derek's face—it was doing something weird. The corners of his lips were pulled upwards in an expression that, on his face, was completely unfamiliar. What she was witnessing was something rare, like a solar eclipse or the Aurora Borealis.

"Charlie!" Stiles whisper-shouted from a little further down the hall. "What the hell are you doing? We've got to go!"

But Charlie ignored him. She narrowed her eyes at the site, trying to make sure she wasn't making the whole thing up. She wasn't.

"Oh my God," Charlie whispered to herself. "It does smile!"

"Charlie, we've got to go," Stiles urged.

"Hold on," she mumbled shoving her hand in her back pocket to grab her phone. "Just let me—" She was abruptly cut off as Stiles grabbed hold of her arm and yanked her after him down the hallway after him. "But—" Charlie protested. "Picture! Stiles, you don't run into Bigfoot and then proceed to _not_ take a picture of it."

"That doesn't make any sense!"

"Of course it makes sense!"

Stiles muttered something about her being twelve different kinds of crazy and grabbed her hand, dragging her towards his dad's office. When they finally reached the door, he released her hand and placed it on the door handle. He looked left and right before opening the door and trying to slide through it with as much stealth as possible. Which, of course, meant that he tripped. Rolling her eyes to herself, Charlie followed him. He ran straight to the back wall where his dad had the lockbox installed. Charlie wrapped her arms around her waist and looked around the office. To Charlie it was kind of like getting a peek into the sheriff's brain. At first glance everything looked a little messy, but the closer she looked the more she could see a sort of logic to how everything was arranged. Everything was in its place. Solved and unsolved.

The unsolved pile was a lot bigger.

But ultimately it wasn't the papers that caught her attention. It was a small silver picture frame. Charlie snatched it, peering down at the image contained within it. It was a woman in her mid-thirties, slender, dark brown, shoulder length hair, dark brown eyes, and an angular face. Charlie wasn't sure why, but for some reason she thought the woman looked like a bird. And even though she had never seen the woman before, she felt familiar somehow. When she heard Stiles swearing at the safe's keypad, she realized why. The eyes. She had the same eyes as Stiles. They weren't the same color or the same shape, but they had the same expression. That spark of curiosity that was always there. So this was Claudia Stilinski. She was beautiful. Stiles had never told her that. Well he hadn't really told her anything about her in the first place. It was the one thing that he didn't talk about all the time.

"No! No, no, no, no, no!"

Stiles's panicked whispers wrenched Charlie back into the moment. She quickly put the picture back down before he turned around and saw her holding it, feeling oddly guilty for some reason. She cleared her throat and tucked her hair behind her ears as she scurried over to him. "What is it?" she hissed, coming up behind him. "What's wrong?"

Stiles's head snapped around to face her, eyes wide and his mouth hanging open. He had to look back and forth between her and a tiny box on the wall before he could find the words. "The—the keys!" he stammered out. "They're gone! They're just frigging gone!"

Charlie swore under her breath and ran her hands down her face. Shit. Crap. Son of a bitch. This was so, so not good. "Okay," she whispered, shaking out her hands and bouncing up and down on her heels as she tried to physically calm herself down. "Okay. So is there any chance that your dad just decided to take the keys home? Or like he forgot them in his pocket or something? Or a curmudgeon-y ghost stole them? Werewolves exist, so that's not totally out of the realm of possibility and—"

"No, Charlie, the keys weren't stolen by a curmudgeon-y ghost!" Stiles hissed back. He held up a small metal plate with busted hinges on it and waved it in front of her face. "Look!" He lifted the bit of metal to a very small, very empty box that was mounted against the wall, jamming it into the thing over and over again like he was hoping it would miraculously stick back on. "Look at this! It was pried off!"

Stiles kept trying to fit the thing on like if he just fixed the lockbox, he would be fixing everything. Reaching forwards, Charlie grabbed the thing out of his hand and slammed it down on his dad's desk. She grabbed his shoulders and spun him around so they were facing each other. "Stiles, focus. Where are the holding cells?"

The expression on Stiles's face went from panicked to pained. "Oh, God, are we actually doing this? We're actually doing this, aren't we?"

"Yes! Now come on!"

Stiles let out a low, whining groan. "Fine," he muttered. Charlie dropped her hands from his shoulders and he trudged past her, muttering to himself. "I swear to freaking God, one of these days there's got to be somebody else around to save the goddamn day."

Charlie rolled her eyes, but followed him out of the sheriff's office. "Okay," he whispered as they stepped through the door. He raised his hand to point them right direction. "The holding cells are just through...huh..."

Stiles's arm stopped moving as he found himself pointing at a man about his height, short, dark brown hair, wearing that standard khaki uniform. "Oh, we were just—" he pointed back and forth between himself and Charlie "—we were just, uh..."

That's when they both figured it out. For Charlie it was the trail behind him, the long streaks of angry red blood led right to him. But Stiles seemed to be focusing on something else. That's when she saw that a small, broken off shaft of wood sticking out of his upper thigh. It didn't take a genius to put two and two together. When Allison said she 'slowed down' the man her grandfather had sent out, that arrow was what she had cryptically alluded to. And that meant that she was standing two feet away from a highly trained assassin.

"Oh shi—"

The expletive didn't even have a chance to be fully pronounced before a hand connected with Stiles's chest, sending him collapsing to the ground. Before she knew what was happening, the man seized hold of her and began yanking her down the hallway and around a corner, making her lose sight of Stiles. She tried to scream for help—there had to be at least one actual cop somewhere in the freaking stating—but a firm hand clamped down on her mouth, stifling any sound and holding her against his chest. She kicked her legs, trying to find her footing, but the man was staggering backwards to quickly for her to get any leverage. Her hands flew up to the arm holding her in place, trying to yank it away and make her escape, but that's the thing about highly trained assassins. They tend to be strong. Her eyes roved around wildly looking for something to grab onto—some type of weapon or something—but the only thing her eyes fell on was a giant syringe filled with a dark, ominous liquid whose needle was poised very close to her jugular.

The adrenaline began to spike, flooding through her veins. That sent every thing into overdrive. Her heart rate sped up, her vision became sharper, and her ears were picking up even the tiniest little sounds. Like the squeaking of sneakers and the soft 'oomph' as Stiles scrambled around the corner and collided with one of the walls. His gaze snapped to hers immediately and all Charlie could see behind those light brown eyes was complete, unadulterated fear. Then he looked up at the man, holding his hands out pleadingly, but before he could get a word out the man spoke.

"Stay back," the man growled. "Stay quiet. Or what's in this syringe goes in her neck. It won't be a fun experience." Stiles made an instinctive move towards her and all of the sudden something sharp pressed into her neck. It wasn't much—just barely enough to break the skin—but she could feel that single drop of blood trailing down her neck. "Ah, ah, ah," the man chided. "I said back off. Now."

If she moved or even breathed too heavily, the needle would only go in deeper. The man pressed the needle in just a little bit further, sending a twinge of pain shooting up and down her neck. But that needle gave her an idea. She looked up at Stiles and nodded imperceptibly. He swallowed heavily and took the tiniest step back. "Just—just don't hurt her, okay?" he begged. "Just let her go. You're not here for her"

"I thought I said something about not talking."

Stiles immediately snapped his mouth shut. "Good choice," the guy grunted

The pressure against the side of her neck lifted as the man pulled the needle away. He began dragging her backwards again, through the door that led to the holding cells. And then, all of the sudden, they were surrounded by alarms and flashing lights. Stiles had pulled the fire alarm. The guys swore loudly, and that's when Charlie made her move. She released her hold on his arm, and swung her arm down. She grabbed the shaft of the arrow and pushed down as hard as she could, digging it deeper into his flesh. A strangled cry erupted from the man's throat and his grasp on her loosened, giving her some room to move. She threw her head back, so her skull connected hard with his nose. There was a sickening crack followed by the light tinkling noise of the syringe falling to the ground.

"You little bitch!"

Charlie managed to slip from his grasp and grabbed his arm and twisted it behind his back, making him give a grunt of pain before she shoved him away from her, through the door to the holding cells. She spun around, fists lifted and ready to fight but her head still swimming from the impact. What she saw next made her stop short. The holding cell where Isaac should be was already wide open. The man seemed to register a change in her face, because he looked behind him as well. But then Charlie's eyes fell on that syringe lying on the ground. It still posed a threat. Unfortunately, it was also sitting feet away from the assassin guy, just close enough to make it a potential bad idea to go after it. She stared at the thing for a second before looking up at Stiles. He seemed to understand what she was going to try to do, because his eyes widened and he shook his head violently. "Charlie, don't—"

It was too late, though. While the hunter's back was turned, she made a move to destroy the syringe, but she wasn't fast enough. The man wheeled around in time to see what she was doing and swung an arm out to strike her. She managed to duck it and struck back, hitting him in the trachea. The man stumbled backwards a bit, gasping for breath and clutching at his throat. Charlie went for the syringe again, but the guy managed to regain his balance long enough to send a kick that landed firmly in Charlie's chest.

Pain radiated through her body and the air left her lungs and she staggered backward. The flashing lights of the alarm bled together, turning into raging flames, and the wailing of the alarm morphed into actual human screams. And then it was as if she had fallen through a door. Or a portal. Because she wasn't in the police station anymore. She was in that room-the one that had latched onto her consciousness and would not leave her alone. She was back at the Hale house, watching the fire consume everything around her. Stiles, Isaac, Derek, the assassin guy, they were all gone, leaving her thoroughly alone.

Charlie let her eyes rove around wildly, looking for the next attack. But it was pointless. He could have been standing right in front of her and she wouldn't have been able to tell the difference. She was fighting blind. No, it was worse than fighting blind. She was fighting ghosts—ones inside and outside of her own head.

All of the sudden, a loud groan echoed through the room. A panel in the ceiling above her broke and swung towards her. She barely had the chance to throw her hands in front of her before she had the chance to throw her hands in front of her face. The panel struck her, once again sending her flying backwards once more. She felt her back slam hard against the wall, her head colliding with the surface. Her vision began to swim and the colors bled together as she slid down the wall. She blinked several times and when she opened her eyes again, she was back in the police station. What felt like full minutes in her head was barely more than a few seconds out here.

Once again, Charlie was left with her eyes darting around trying to find out what was going on. Stiles was a little ways off, collapsed on the floor like she was and clutching at his arm. A feeling of nauseated guilt washed through her, making her stomach turn. He had gotten hurt. Because of her. Because she had to go and try and get that syringe. But Stiles wasn't looking at her. He was looking right above her. Charlie looked up to find the man looming over her, a snarl etched into the lines of his face. "You need to learn to mind your own business, little girl," he sneered. "Before you get really hurt."

Somehow, even with the sound of the alarm, Charlie could here the sounds of lurching footsteps as a pair of black but bloodstained shoes made their way to the center of the room. The assassin leaned down and picked up the syringe. He smirked slightly as he straightened up again, but he didn't get to keep that sensation very long.

A blur appeared out of nowhere, colliding with the hunter. It was only when its movement slowed enough to pin the man to the desk that she could fully register what it was. Or who it was. The sandy blonde curls were the giveaway, because the face was something she could barely recognize. The forehead was more pronounced, the cheekbones bulging, and long, deadly fangs protruded among his other bared teeth. Nope. Isaac wasn't home anymore.

Charlie kicked her legs against the ground, pushing herself along the wall to get to Stiles. Her abdomen ached with each movement. Hell, it ached when she breathed. The hunter might not have cracked a rib, but he certainly came close. She looked up from the floor only to realize that Stiles was doing the same thing, scrambling towards her. The two of them practically ran into each other at the corner of the room.

"You okay?" they asked simultaneously.

But neither of them got the chance to answer the question. Isaac emitted a low growl, grabbing hold of the hunter and ramming him against a wall. The needle still in his hand, the hunter swung it upwards towards Isaac's neck, but he was too slow. Isaac seized the man's arm and twisted it back away from him until Charlie heard a distinct snap, like a branch breaking. He planted his hand on the hunter's forehead, shoving him back so his head collided with the wall and he crumpled to the ground. Isaac stood over him, his chest heaving not with the effort—what he had just don't hadn't taken any effort at all—but with pure, murder-y rage.

He was going to kill him. Isaac was going to kill that man. Or at the very least he was thinking about killing him.

The sudden sound of breaking glass made both Stiles and Charlie twitch violently, looking in the direction of the sound. Turns out Derek had finally decided to join them. He had stomped on the syringe, leaving behind nothing but little shards of glass and an inconveniently placed puddle. Unfortunately Stiles and Charlie weren't the only ones whose attention was caught was caught by the sound. Isaac wheeled around, his eyes searching for its source. They fell on Derek, but soon slid past him to find what they were really looking for—an object his aggression could focus on. Which, in this case, was her and Stiles.

A low rumble issued forth from Isaac's throat and he advanced on them, taking large, striding steps forward. Charlie didn't pretend to know Isaac very well—in reality she only really started to know him a few days ago—but she had hoped to see something, a flicker of recognition that might indicate that he knew who she was and what he was doing. There was none. His face was contorted with pure, unadulterated ferocity. The boy was gone. The animal was what remained.

Charlie and Stiles scrambled in a futile attempt to get away, but they were stuck in that corner—pinned down. They ended up drawing closer together, trying to make each other as small as possible. Charlie clutched at the sleeve of Stiles's jacket like it was a security blanket and he pulled her to him so the two of them were curled up right next to each other. It was like the both of them were trying to edge in front of each other, blocking the other from Isaac's onslaught.

Then another roar echoed against the walls, drowning out Isaac. Charlie felt as if her bones were vibrating inside her body through the sheer force of the sound. Derek stood calmly at the center of the room, drawn to his full height and his eyes flashing red. The authority that he carried was palpable, making the air crackle with static electricity.

The second he heard the noise, Isaac scampered to the corner, cowering in one of the corners next to the fallen hunter. He covered his head with his hands, like he was guarding himself from the sound, and then something strange happened. The fangs retracted, the cheekbones and forehead sank to their normal, the claws disappeared, and the yellow eyes faded to their usual blue. When he removed his arms from his head, he was completely back to normal again.

Derek's head snapped around to look at Stiles and Charlie, a self-satisfied smirk plastered over his face. At that point Charlie concluded the danger had passed and relaxed slightly. It was only then that she realized that she was holding Stiles's hand again. She slowly began to release it, but when she did, his hand tightened even more, making her exhale sharply. Somehow they always ended up here, dragging each other across the finish line.

"How—how did you do that?" Stiles stammered out, staring up at Derek almost in awe.

Derek shrugged almost imperceptibly. "I'm the alpha."

"Well that's great Derek," Charlie interjected sarcastically. "You're a bona fide badass, bully for you."

She pushed herself to her feet, fighting back a wince as her bruised ribs shifted. Suddenly a hand looped under her arm, helping her up. She looked up to find Stiles staring at her in concern. "What happened to you?" Derek demanded, eyeing her curiously.

"Nothing," Charlie muttered, shaking her head. "I'm fine."

"Wha—no you're not!" Stiles growled. "When that guy kicked you, I heard something go crunch! There was a distinct crunch-like sound that happened! Twice!"

"Look, someone's going to notice the alarm," Charlie said waving her hand around at all the lights. "We've got about three minutes before like six guys come busting in here."

Derek's jaw twitched, but he nodded in agreement. He marched over to Isaac and grabbed him under his arm, hauling the now traumatized-looking boy to his feet. "Come on," he growled. "Time to go."

He began half-walking, half-dragging Isaac to the door, but then stopped suddenly, staring over his shoulder at the both of them. Stiles bristled slightly under the glare and faced off with Derek, planting his hands on his hips. "Okay! See ya! You're welcome!"

"She needs to come too," Derek said bluntly.

Charlie blinked in surprise and Stiles let out an almost manic-sounding laugh. "Are you ser—you're serious right now? Please. There's no way she's gonna disappear into the night with a coupla werewolves on a full moon!"

"You want to explain to your dad what she's doing here?" Derek spat, pointing at her. "Can you come up with a reason for why you've got a friend bleeding in the holding cells? I'll make sure she gets home safe if that's what you're worried about."

"Huh, yes, that is what I'm worried about!" Stiles exclaimed. "And no—no, you won't!"

"He's right," Charlie murmured.

Stiles's head snapped around to glare at her, an expression of betrayal on his face. "WHAT?!"

"He's right, Stiles," she insisted. "I've got no reason to be here. None that'll make sense to the cops anyway. None that'll make sense to your dad. It invites way too many questions! Isaac just broke out of his holding cell, Stiles. That makes him even more guilty, and with me here? We don't want people looking at this any more closely than they already will!"

Stiles opened his mouth to protest one more time, but Charlie cut him off. "I'll meet you at your car. I'll wait there. I'm not going anywhere."

Stiles ground his teeth together and his jaw twitched, but his shoulders sagged slightly in acquiescence. Sighing heavily, he ran his hands down his face in frustration. "The window in interrogation room five can open. It's seven feet off the ground, but you can probably make it. Go right then left and it's four doors down."

Without another word, Derek marched Isaac out of the holding cells and towards interrogation room five. Charlie lingered for a moment longer, giving Stiles a reassuring look. Or at least she would have if he would freaking make eye contact with her. She reached out a hand and squeezed his shoulder comfortingly. "I'll see you in a couple of minutes, okay."

Stiles's eyes flickered from her hand on his shoulder to her face. He exhaled sharply, but nodded despite his obvious reservations. "Sure. See you in a few minutes."

In that moment, Charlie really, really didn't want to leave. She wanted to stand there next to Stiles and hold his hand while he talked his way through this crap-fest with his dad. But her being there wasn't going to do anybody any good. And her holding his hand wasn't going to help in her stop having the 'butterflies in the stomach' feeling. So she removed her hand from his shoulder and slipped out of the room. She was just in time too. Just as she turned the corner to the hall, she heard the pounding of government-issued shoes pounding against the floors, heading straight to the holding cells.

Charlie's body ached with every move she made, but she forced herself to keep standing straight. When she snuck into the interrogation room, that high-set window was already opened, wind blasting through it. Isaac was gone already, but Derek remained, arms folded across his chest and leaning against the wall next to the window. Charlie couldn't help but roll her eyes. She was about 95% sure he practiced cool poses when nobody else was around.

"Where's Isaac?" she demanded.

"Just went through," Derek said, jerking his head in the direction of the window. "Already on the other side."

"Unsupervised?" Charlie hissed. "Are you really that much of an idiot?"

Derek let out a scoff and rolled his eyes at her like she was the idiot for asking the question. "I'm the alpha," he informed her. "If I give a member of my pack an order, they follow it."

"Nice to see that your newfound authority hasn't affected your ego at all," she drawled out sarcastically.

Derek narrowed his eyes at her and let out a low grunt. "Do you want help getting out of here or not?" he growled.

Charlie let out a shaky breath and looked up at the window. It was way, way out of her reach, especially given the condition she was now. But still, the situation she found herself in now was kind of ridiculous. "You're going to give me a boost?" she demanded skeptically.

"Yeah!" Derek sneered, nodding at her. "That's pretty much it! Now get over here before the cops find us!"

Charlie eyed him warily, but walked forwards anyway. Derek leaned forwards and laced his fingers together to form a step. Blowing out a long, careful breath, Charlie placed one foot on that step and braced a hand against the wall for balance. "Isaac's not going to try and kill me again, is he?" she asked, peering down at Derek.

Derek glowered up at her, his patience wearing thin. "No. Not unless I tell him to. Which I might do if you don't shut up and get through that window."

"Alright, alright," she muttered to herself. "Untwist your panties."

For once Derek opted to totally ignore her idiotic quips and hoisted her upwards with almost impossible ease. Within moments Charlie found herself clutching the sill and scrambling out of it. Her chest pressed against the concrete, sending a stabbing pain through her. "Shit, shit, shit," she groaned, trying to ignore the ache. Somehow she managed to slide though, hanging onto the ledge by her fingertips before lightly dropping to the ground. She instinctively brushed off her clothes.

"Charlie?"

The quiet, pained nature of the voice made the breath catch in her throat. She looked over to her left and she saw Isaac almost in the same position he had been after Derek called him off—curled into a tiny ball like he was trying to make the entire world go away. She blinked at him a few times before she could say anything. What the hell were you supposed to say in a situation like this?

"Hey, Isaac," she said breathlessly. Her voice sounded light and almost cheerful and totally out of place, like they had run into each other at a coffee shop or something. "How's it going?"

He looked up at her, his blue, watery eyes filled with regret, but only for a moment. He was never that great at maintaining eye contact. She'd seen a similar expression before, the night of the last full moon, only it was Scott wearing it then. "I'm so, so sorry," Isaac whispered, shaking his head almost pathologically. "I never meant to...I wouldn't hurt you. I mean I wouldn't want to hurt you. Not—not ever."

"Okay," Charlie whispered, nodding at him. "I guess it's a good thing you didn't, then."

He let out an anguished whining noise and grasped the sides of his head, driving his fingers into the sandy blonde curls and pulling slightly. "I—I didn't know it would be like this. I just—I just wanted to—"

"Get power over your own life," Charlie finished for him. "Yeah, I get it."

Isaac had been rocking back and forth, but when she said that he froze, and after avoiding her gaze the whole time his eyes snapped to hers. "You do?"

"Sure," she said with a shrug. Charlie circled around him, careful to stay at a safe distance, and crouched down so they were at the same height. "But there's no going back from this, Isaac," she continued. "You made your bed and you have to lie in it now. I just hope it's going to be a comfortable one for you."

"If the two of you are done socializing," another voice interrupted, "I think it's about time we should be making our escape."

At the sound of Derek's voice, Charlie spun around. He was already standing there, arms folded across his chest again. He hadn't made a sound jumping through that window. Hell, he had probably been standing there behind her the whole time. Derek surveyed Isaac and Charlie, raising his eyebrows at them. "The police aren't going to waste all their time dealing with that unconscious hunter," he grunted. "They're going to be looking for Isaac soon too."

Charlie wanted to make another quip about an inflated ego, but if breathing hurt, sarcasm was going to hurt even more. So instead she just followed the other two as they darted through the parking lot, staying low as they darted through the lines of cars to avoid detection. Finally they made it to the faded blue panels of the Jeep. Charlie expected Isaac and Derek to continue on into the night and leave her there to wait for Stiles, but much to her surprise, that didn't happen. All three of them stopped and Derek turned to Isaac. "Go hide in the forest," he ordered. "Stay there. I'll find you."

Isaac shot one more look in Charlie's direction, fear and regret covering his face, before he scampered off, disappearing into the black. "Cute trick," she murmured under her breath as she watched Isaac go. "Just don't expect it to work on me."

Derek narrowed his eyes at her. "Yes, Charlie. I think we've all established that you do not listen to me."

Collapsing against the side of the car, Charlie clutched at her ribs. The stabbing pain radiated outward from the spot where the hunter had kicked her, permeating every part of her body. Her breaths came out quick and shaky breaths. Derek gave her a funny look, like he was sizing her up or something. Charlie shifted uncomfortably under Derek's scrutiny. "What?"

"You're in pain," Derek said simply. There was no sympathy or concern in his voice. It was a simple statement of fact. Charlie didn't really expect any of that kind of stuff from him, and normally it wouldn't bother her but this time it sort of pissed her off. Mostly because she couldn't pull the 'I'm fine' card with him. He would know if she was lying.

"Yeah, Derek," she shot back. "While you were flirting with the lady at the desk, I was a little busy getting my ass kicked."

Derek narrowed his eyes at her in frustration. "Give me your hand."

"What?" Charlie demanded, giving him a suspicious look. "No. Why?"

"Just give me your hand," Derek growled. "I can help take the pain away."

Her nose wrinkled instinctively and let out a derisive scoff. "Okay, I was kind of joking about the size of your ego before, but seriously? 'I can take the pain away'? I'm surprised your neck can support the weight of your head."

Derek rolled his eyes and grabbed her hand, squeezing it hard. Charlie made a weird, squeaky noise of protest and tried to yank her hand away, but Derek grabbed on even tighter and before she had the chance to say 'dude, what the hell?' something changed. At first it hurt even more. All the pain began to concentrate in her veins, lighting her insides on fire. But then the pain began to move down her arms towards her fingertips and then disappeared where her hand came into contact with Derek's and that stabbing pain that had filled her was replaced by a dull ache.

Charlie exhaled sharply and looked up at Derek. Well this was new, her feeling grateful to Derek. This wasn't a situation she was used to. Neither was he, for that matter. Was she supposed to say thank you? She studied that hostile, broody look on his face. Nope. No thank yous. They didn't do thank yous. It didn't fit the parameters of their relationship. "Okay," Charlie finally said, "I appreciate this and everything, but now you're just kinda holding my hand and it's getting awkward."

The look she received in response was not a happy one. He rolled his eyes and made a move to leave, but Charlie grabbed his shoulder to stop him. Derek gave her the same look he gave Stiles when he had grabbed his shoulder, but she ignored it. "Isaac's going to be okay, right?"

Derek's jaw twitched slightly, but he nodded. "I'll make sure he is."

"You guys gonna be fugitives together?" she asked drolly. "Are you gonna be Thelma and Louise. You'd get to be the Thelma."

Derek let out a bitter snort and narrowed his eyes. "The charges were dropped."

"Whatever," Charlie said, waving her hand dismissively. "Just make sure he's okay. No offense, but the new position you put him in kinda screwed him over. He's a friend now."

"All this worrying about him and trying to save him is only going to make him like you more," Derek replied. "You do know that, right?"

"We're friends now," Charlie said, scrunching up her face in an expression of confusion. "Why would you care anyway?"

"Because the conversational topics are going to become even more redundant than they were this morning," Derek snarked back.

Charlie furrowed her eyebrows even more. "What the hell are you talking about?"

A tiny, knowing little smirk pulled at the corner of his lips. "You know, for such an observant person, you really miss out on things that are painfully obvious. And when I say painful, I mean it is physically painful for me to watch."

"And what the hell is _that_ supposed to mean?"

Apparently that was a question Derek didn't quite feel like answering because he got to his feet and ran off into the forest after Isaac, leaving Charlie alone. Exhaling sharply, Charlie got up and climbed into the backseat of the Jeep. She stretched out on the bench, lying back so that she wasn't visible to anyone who might be passing by, and stared out the window up at the sky. The moon must have past its peak by now, meaning the worst of it was over, for Isaac anyway. They still had to deal with the fallout.

It was only about fifteen minutes before she heard the doors to the sheriff's station bust open and car engines start roaring to life, but she didn't feel that shot of fear go through her. Derek and Isaac had to be long gone by that point. It was another seven minutes before she heard the driver's door to the Jeep swing open. The weight of the car shifted slightly as Stiles got into his seat, muttering under his breath. Charlie popped up quickly, leaning her armrests on the seat in front.

"Hey!"

Stiles let out an unmanly yelp and flailed around, hitting the car horn. "Oh my G—God!" he shouted, spinning in his seat to look at her. "Seriously?"

Charlie shrugged lightly in apology. "Sorry."

"No," he said, waving his hand dismissively. "It's cool. You're still here, so it's cool." He squeezed his eyes shut for a moment and sighed before opening them again. "You ready to go home?"

Charlie let out a snort and pressed her lips together lips together in a thin smile. "Yeah, Stiles. I think I'm ready to go home."

Nodding to himself, Stiles shoved the keys in the ignition and turned on the car while she made her way into the front seat. "So what's the damage?" she asked, buckling her seatbelt.

Stiles sighed heavily and pulled out of the parking space. "You mean other than the fact that the door to the holding cell is busted open?" he replied. "Everybody's freaking out over the fake deputy thing and nobody's got a clue what's actually going on. But Isaac's been upgraded from person of interest to main suspect for his dad's murder."

Charlie slid down in her seat, propping her feet up on the dashboard. "I guess we always knew that was going to happen." She stole a sidelong glance at Stiles. "And you? What happened with you and your dad?"

"Not much," he mumbled, drumming his fingers nervously against the steering wheel. "I wasn't really the center of his focus. He told me to go home and stay out of trouble."

"Of course," Charlie nodded. "Right, of course he did."

The car got really, really quiet after that. It felt tense. Between the full moon, Isaac, Stiles's dad, and the whole disaster they had participated in there were plenty of things for them to talk about—plenty of things for them to say—but neither of them seemed to know how to go about it. Plus Stiles had this look on his face, like he was thinking really, really hard about something, and for some reason that worried her. He barely had more of a filter than she did and usually blurted out just about everything that came to mind, and even when he was quiet she could usually tell what he was thinking about. This time, though, not so much.

Charlie sat with her head resting against the window. To the outward observer she might have looked like she was falling asleep, but that couldn't be less true. Her mind was jumping around, completely unable to shut up as she replayed the night in her brain—that room filled with fire and then seeing Stiles on the ground.

"How's, um, how's your arm?" Charlie asked, clearing her throat awkwardly.

Stiles frowned in confusion and looked over at her. "My arm?"

"Yeah," Charlie continued. "After that guy, um...after the whole fight thing I saw you on the ground. You were holding your arm. Are you—are you okay?"

"Wha—yeah, I'm fine," Stiles said. "That was nothing. Worse happens in lacrosse practice like every day."

Charlie bit her lip and wrapped her arms around her waste. "I'm sorry," she whispered.

The expression on Stiles's face looked genuinely confused. "Sorry for what?"

"For going after the syringe," she replied. "I screwed up. It was stupid. I—I should have just left it but I saw it lying there and I thought I could get to it and—and I just ended up getting people hurt. You got hurt."

"You didn't do anything wrong," Stiles said, shaking her head at her. "And the only person who actually got hurt was you. And that hunter guy, but did you forget the part where he stabbed you in the neck?" Charlie her hand to her neck, frowning as her fingers brushed against the partially dried track of blood trailing down her neck. Stiles spluttered and wildly waved his hands in her face. "You did, didn't you?! You totally forgot you were stabbed!"

"Please, I was barely stabbed," she muttered.

"Barely sta—you are ridiculous, you know that right? Absolutely ridiculous. Son of a—son of a bitch." He sighed heavily and pinched at the bridge of his nose. "We're all safe now, okay? We pulled it off. We're good. Until the next time something like this happens." He looked over at her with narrowed eyes. "You are good, right? Because for a second there, right before the guy hit you, you looked a bit...off. Lost."

"Yeah, I'm good," Charlie replied quickly. "I guess I'm out of practice. My reflexes aren't as good as they used to be." Stiles didn't look entirely convinced, but he didn't press any further. She liked to think it was because he did take her words at face value, but in reality it was probably because he knew he wouldn't get a straight answer.

Silence reigned in the car once more, but that intense look of introspection was gone, so Charlie relaxed a little. It began to rain and Stiles switched on the windshield wipers. They had an oddly calming effect, flying back and forth with the regularity of a metronome in a way that was almost hypnotic. It allowed Charlie to time her breathing, calming her down. And then Stiles gave her a sly, almost amused look. "You know if this was a movie, right now would be the part where someone launches into a giant inspirational speech."

"Okay," Charlie drawled out, eyeing him curiously. "Agreed. But what's your point."

Stiles made a face and shrugged, shooting her a side glance. "Nothing. I just figured with all your 'debate team' skills you should be able to whip one up really quick."

Charlie gave a long groan and rolled her eyes, kicking absently at the dashboard. "Ugh, seriously?" she demanded. "What the hell is it with you and the fact that I was on the debate team? What's the deal?"

"There's no deal," he replied earnestly. "It's just that—I mean, it's been a seriously long day. I know I'm ready to be inspired."

He stared at her with his eyebrows raised in excited expectation. It almost made Charlie want to laugh at his usual irrepressible enthusiasm. "Fine."

Stiles blinked in surprise. "Really?"

"Yeah, sure. Let's do this thing." Charlie removed her feet from the dashboard and straightened up in her seat, trying to give herself a more dignified air. "Mankind," she pronounced proudly. "That word should have new meaning for all of us today. We can't be consumed by our petty diff—"

"Stop, stop, stop!" Stiles interrupted, holding up a hand in the air as if in formal objection. "That's cheating."

"How is that cheating?"

"Dude," Stiles said, narrowing his eyes at her. "You totally just ripped off the speech from 'Independence Day'."

"What?" Charlie said throwing her hands up in the air. "You wanted an inspirational speech. That's an inspirational speech. And how did you recognize it from like two sentences?"

"The coach gives it before every single lacrosse game," Stiles replied.

"Really?" Charlie said, furrowing her eyebrows at him. "That's kind of weird."

"Oh, and it's not weird that you have the entire freaking speech memorized?" Stiles shot back.

"No! It's a good speech!"

The two of them continued to bicker and somehow that conversation slid into an in-depth discussion on the ethical issues of copyright infringement, and then, before she knew it, they were pulling up in front of her house. It was kind of funny. A little while ago she almost wanted to throw herself out of the car because of the awkwardness. Now she didn't want to leave.

"Thanks for the ride," she murmured, shooting Stiles a small smile.

"Y—yeah. Yeah, sure," Stiles stammered out, nodding back at her. "Of course. Any time. Do you want me to give you a ride into school tomorrow? Since you left your car at school and everything?"

"Thanks, but I could just catch a ride in with Lydia," she replied. "You don't have to go out of your way or anything."

Stiles frowned to himself and twisted around in his chair, staring out the driver's side window in the direction of Lydia's house. "R—right," he said through an uncomfortable laugh. "Yeah, I kinda spaced out on that one didn't I?"

Charlie sighed heavily and punched him lightly in the shoulder. "I know it's seriously anticlimactic and everything to end the evening with a 'see ya tomorrow', but...see ya tomorrow, Stilinski."

She reached for the handle to the passenger side door, ready for the rest of the evening to be supremely boring, and then her eyes fell on something unexpected sitting in the driveway. A silver Prius. Mel's silver Prius. Not good. Very much not good.

"Hey, Charlie—" Stiles started to say.

"Crap on a cracker!" Charlie hissed loudly, cutting Stiles off. Immediately she went for her messenger where it lay at her feet and began digging around in it frantically.

"Whoa, hey, Charlie," Stiles said confusedly. "What's going on?"

She glanced up at him for a moment before returning to her bag. "Mel's here. Mel is not supposed to be here for at least another half hour and—" Her hands finally found their way around her phone. She pulled it out of the bag, fumbling with it for a moment before she managed to flip the screen in her direction. When she saw it, she let out a bitter laugh and threw a hand in the air. "And she's called me four times. Great. I have successfully freaked out my aunt. This day just keeps getting better and better." She shot him an apologetic wince. "Sorry, I've got to go."

"Hey, wait a second," Stiles said, putting a hand on her shoulder to make her stop. He practically stood up in his seat and reached into the back seat, coming back with a water bottle and a roll of paper towels.

"What is that for?" she asked warily.

"Ugh," Stiles said, rolling his eyes at her. "You have the short term memory of a fruit fly." He poured some of the water on the paper towels. "Come here."

He took hold of her chin and twisted her head to the side before brushing all her hair over her shoulder. Charlie's heart jumped in her chest and she instinctively pulled back, wondering what he was doing. He reached forward and wiped at the side of her neck with the paper towel before holding it up for her to see. "You forgot you got stabbed. Again."

"I did not get stab—"

"Yeah, Charlie," he snapped back. "Yeah, you did. And if you think Mel's not going to notice blood running down your neck, you're crazy. Or an idiot. Probably both. Now sit still."

He began wiping away at the blood again, and Charlie was fairly certain she was having a mini-panic attack. Her heart was beating really fast and she could feel her face beginning to heat up. She clenched her teeth together and kept her breathing even. These stupid moments—they made her excited and happy, but at the same time they hurt. Because the boy who made her feel things like this for the first time in her entire life—her best friend—was in love with her other best friend. Jesus, her life sounded like some Shakespearean play. Why couldn't she just stop or turn it off? That would have made everything so much easier.

"There," Stiles said, wrenching her back to awareness. His hand lingered at her neck for a moment, but then he pulled it back quickly like he had forgotten it there. He cleared his throat and shot her an awkward smile. "All cleaned up."

"Right," Charlie muttered, jerking her thumb in the direction of her front door. "I—I should go. Before Mel has a full-on heart attack at the age of twenty eight." Stiles shot her a salute and she slung her bag over her shoulder before making a move for the door. She hauled herself out of the Jeep and was just about to slam the door when something stopped her. "Hey, what were you going to say?" she asked suddenly.

"What, uh, what do you mean?" Stiles returned, scratching at the back of his neck.

"Before my Mel-induced freak-out you were trying to tell me something," Charlie elaborated, waving her hand in a circle like she was rewinding time.

Stiles gripped the steering wheel a little tighter and exhaled sharply. He opened his mouth to speak, but then his eyes travelled past her to the front door of her house and he closed it again. "You know what...It's not the right time for that. Go take care of Mel."

"O—okay," Charlie murmured in confusion. "Bye, then."

"Bye."

She shut the door, but stood standing in place as Stiles drove off down the street, watching him go. Uncertainty weighed on her heavily. It felt like somebody had placed a weight on her chest, making it difficult for her to breathe. She shook her head, trying to rid herself of all those anxieties and doubts. She needed to walk through that front door like today had been a normal day and spin a convincing story for Mel.

About a millisecond after Charlie unlocked the front door, she could hear the sound of heels clacking against hardwood floors. "I'm ho—"

"Charlie!" Mel exclaimed, rounding the corner into the foyer. She had her angry badger face on, which made Charlie swallow heavily. The last time she had seen that face was Christmas when she was six and had used the heel of one of her Manolo Blahniks to dig a hole to China in her dad's backyard.

"Where have you been?!" Mel screeched. "I left you like five messages and you didn't respond to any of them! Do you have any idea what time it is?!"

"I'm sorry," Charlie winced apologetically. "I'm really sorry, Mel. I didn't expect you home this early."

Mel let out a musical scoff and flipped her hair over her shoulder. It was the closest gesture she had to 'anger'. "Is that supposed to be an excuse? That I wouldn't be aware that you were out till 9:00 p.m.? Is that supposed to make me feel better? And why didn't you answer my calls? I was—I was very worried."

Charlie dropped her keys in the bowl on that table near the front door and removed her bag from her shoulder. "I forgot my phone on vibrate," Charlie explained. "I had no idea you even might have called until I saw your car in the driveway. I was with friends, that's all."

"And _where_ were you with these so-called friends?"

"My drug dealer needed to be bailed out of jail," Charlie deadpanned. "Now I get a discount on all future purchases. It was really too good a deal to pass up."

"Charlie!"

"Sorry!" Charlie said, throwing her hands in the air. "Sorry, reflexive sarcasm. My car battery died. Stiles and I went to study for the chemistry test coming up, and then he gave me a ride home. That's it. I'm sorry I didn't let you know earlier, but wasn't expecting you back till 9:30 like usual. I didn't think it would be a big deal."

The lie came easily and was at least kind of close to the truth, so it wasn't that difficult to swallow, but the mention of the uncharacteristically early arrival back home, something in Mel's face changed and she wrapped her hands around her waist. She looked oddly guilty for some reason. As Charlie understood things right now, Mel had absolutely no reason for Mel to feel guilty. Which meant Mel was hiding something. Mel never hid anything. Mel never had anything to hide. Charlie took a small step towards her aunt and the woman took an instinctive step back, wobbling slightly on her heels. That clinched it. When it came to wearing heels, Mel was a rock. That wobble meant something.

"Mel," she drawled out in a curious, slightly accusatory tone. "Why are you here so early?"

Mel exhaled sharply and straightened up, delicately tucking her hair behind her ears. "Well if you were studying, I can let this go. I'm not going to be one of those guardians who lo-jacks their kids or checks their cell phone GPS, but next time you decide to go somewhere after school, just let me know."

Well that was strange. Mel had reacted more extremely than anticipated at Charlie's late arrival, and now she was backtracking really, really fast. There was something else afoot here. Something that had nothing to do with her. Charlie took several steps forward and leaned against the stair-rail leading to the second floor, peering at Mel curiously. This time Mel didn't take a corresponding step backwards, but she was blinking an awful lot. "You're deflecting."

A delicate snort came out of her aunt's nose and she raised her eyebrows at Charlie. "I'm not deflecting, Charlie. I'm parenting." The two of them began a bizarre sort of staring contest, like the first one of them to blink was the one to admit there was something else going on. Mel cleared her throat and suddenly spun on her heel, marching towards the kitchen. "Do you want some hot chocolate? I want some hot chocolate."

"Ha!" Charlie shouted, following her aunt. Mel quickly darted to the refrigerator, placing the large kitchen island between herself and her niece and making sure she was facing the opposite direction. But Charlie wasn't going to be deterred. She planted her hands on the island and leaned forwards, glaring at her aunt. "That's evading," she said, jabbing a finger in Mel's direction while the woman fumbled with the milk. "You're evading."

Mel froze for a moment and then slowly turned around. She placed the milk on the marble countertop and stared at it a moment before looking up at Charlie. "I went out to dinner," she admitted.

"And what?" Charlie said with a shrug. "You forgot to pick me up something? It's fine. I've got some leftover couscous in the fridge."

That's when Mel's face screwed up into an apologetic expression. "I didn't go alone. I went with somebody else."

"Like a date?" Charlie asked. Mel gave a tiny nod and a huge smile broke across Charlie's face. "Mel, that's fantastic! Unless it went badly in which case I'm sorry, but why would you not want to tell me that?"

Mel began bouncing up and down on the balls of her feet. "The date was with Robert."

"Robert?" Charlie demanded, throwing her hands in the air. "Who the hell is Robert?"

"Robert," Mel repeated as if that meant something. "From your school. I chaperoned the school dance with him."

The gears in Charlie's head turned very slowly, grinding against each other like they were covered in rust. It shouldn't have taken her that long to add two and two together, but she probably just didn't want to believe it. But her mind forced itself to come to a conclusion. "Coach Bobby Finstock," she whispered. Mel bit her lip and nodded.

"Coach Finstock?!"

"I know I should have told you earlier," Mel said pleadingly. "And I know that I should have asked your permission first. Having your aunt date a teacher can get awkward and—You've been through so much lately with Lydia and I just...it happened so fast. He—he called me and I figured, why not? What have I got to lose?"

Charlie's hand went straight to her forehead and her mouth opened and closed like a dying fish gasping for breath. She knew Finstock had been interested—of course he was interested, it was Mel—and she knew they danced with each other that one time, but this was all becoming very real, very fast and she had to sit down. Exhaling sharply, she pulled out a chair and sank into it. When her eyes finally made their way back to Mel, the woman's hands were clasped together and raised to her mouth, like she was begging for forgiveness. "Are—are you sure?" Charlie asked in disbelief. "I mean, he literally doesn't check off any of the boxes on your list. He's not polite, he's not soft-spoken and earnest, he's not blonde, he doesn't play a musical instrument, he doesn't own a boat—"

"Owning a boat was never on my list, Charlie," Mel whispered.

"But it was on mine!" Charlie said. "Mel, are you sure he can make you happy?"

Mel sighed and circled back around the kitchen island, pulling out the chair next to Charlie's. "Charlie, I wrote that list when I was young and ridiculous. I have dated more than one person who checked off every one of those boxes and none of them made me happy. You know what I found out? A list of characteristics and traits, however extensive, doesn't add up to a person. A person's 'self' can't be defined. You can't go around seeking out somebody that conforms to a list. The world is so much messier than that. If you run into somebody and there might be a chance that they could be right, you owe it to yourself to at least give it a shot, don't you think?"

"If you have a shot," Charlie muttered, her mind drifting back to her unfortunate position. "Yeah, I guess you do." She reached out and took Mel's hand, squeezing it comfortingly. "And Finstock?" she asked.

"He makes me laugh," Mel said with a shrug. "He cares about his students. He treats me well. He's a good man. That adds up to a lot these days."

Charlie bit the inside of her cheek and nodded. "Okay," she said without hesitation. "Then go for it."

Mel looked up at her in surprise. "R—really. You don't mind? Even though he's your teacher."

She jerked her head to the side noncommittally and blew out a long breath. "I want you to be happy, Mel. If you think there's even the tiniest chance of this making you happy, then, yeah, go for it. Whatever it is. I'll back you 100%. Every time. No matter what."

A radiant smile spread across Mel's face and she lurched forwards, pulling Charlie into a tight hug. Charlie let out a soft 'oomph' as the air was knocked out of her, followed by a searing pain. Whatever Derek had done to help her back at the police station, it was beginning to wear off. She ignored it, squeezing Mel back as tight as she could for as long as she could. "Thank you," Mel whispered into her ear. "Have I told you how wonderful you are?"

"Not nearly as much as I would like," Charlie murmured under her breath.

When Mel withdrew from the hug, she was beaming. "Well, you are wonderful," she said grabbing both sides of Charlie's face and planting a kiss on her forehead. "Absolutely wonderful. Now how about that hot chocolate?"

Mel hopped up from her chair and went to the cabinet to grab the mugs some mugs, but Charlie shook her head. "No thanks, I'm good," Charlie said, standing up as well. "I think I'm going to just crash and reconcile all—" she waved her hands around in no direction in particular "—all this in my brain. If that's okay?"

"S—sure," Mel murmured, sounding slightly disappointed. "Yeah, of course."

A wave of guilt crashed into Charlie, but she knew that if she didn't get out of their soon, she wouldn't be able to hide the pain that was beginning to reemerge. "How about tomorrow?" Charlie said quickly. "We could—we could do a movie and spa night thing and you can tell me about your...date. I got ahead in all my schoolwork this weekend and studied a ton for chemistry today so I wouldn't be missing homework or anything."

The smile reappeared on Mel's face and Charlie sighed quietly in relief. "Sure," Mel said brightly. "I'll close up early and pick us up some dinner."

"Love you, Mel."

"Love you too, Charlie."

With that Charlie made her way out of the kitchen and hauled up the stairs to the bathroom and locked the door. After a day like this, she needed to be alone and she needed a bath. A long, girly bath using things that smelled of lavender with hot water where she could soak her muscles and get some sort of relief. She grabbed the fluffiest of the towels she could find and turned the water on hot enough that steam rose in clouds and it turned her skin red.

As the tub began to slowly fill with water, Charlie turned to face the mirror. From across the room it didn't look like there was anything wrong, but as she got closer she began to pick up on the signs. Exhaustion was written into every line of her face, but it went further than that. There was actually something _wrong_ with her. Charlie shrugged out of her jacket and slowly and carefully peeled off her shirt, leaving her in her bra. Her reflection already showed deep purple forming across her middle, and if she looked close enough she was fairly certain she could see the patterning of the tread of the hunter's boot stamped into her skin.

This was a wake-up call. She had ignored the things going on in her head, she had ignored the hallucinations, but it was now painfully aware that she couldn't do that anymore. Tonight showed her that. One of her 'episodes' in the wrong place at the wrong time could spell complete disaster. She had tried so hard to convince everybody that she had everything together that she ended up lying to them all, to herself more than anyone else. But even as she became, for the first time, truly aware of the problem, she didn't know what to do.

Charlie stripped off the rest of her clothes and stepped into the tub, sliding into it until she was immersed. The heat of the water stung her skin, but it was the good type of pain—the type that washed away everything else that was so much worse. The heat and the quiet and the smell of lavender engulfed her and, if only for a moment, they let her forget. And she really, really needed to forget.

Charlie inhaled deeply, sucking in as much breath as she could, and disappeared completely under the water. Opening her eyes, she looked up at the surface, watching the light dance as the water refracted it this way and that. She could hide there for a few seconds, but soon she would be forced to come up for air.

**Chapter 9 – The Last Minute SOUNDTRACK  
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Charlie, Stiles, and Derek all pull up in front of the sheriff's station.

-~-~-~-~-Pride (Let's Drive To Alaska Remix) – The New Division

Charlie gets attacked and is dragged off by the hunter.

-~-~-~-~-Bad Machine (feat. Insomnia) – Aami, Insomnia

Charlie watches the cops disperse and waits for Stiles in the Jeep.

-~-~-~-~-Medusa – GEMS

Stiles drives Charlie home, and there's a little bit of tension.

-~-~-~-~-Lost Communication – Anothers Blood (LISTEN TO THIS ONE)

Charlie contemplates what's wrong with her and slips under the water of the bath. If you were talking visuals, the way I would end the chapter/episode is with a shot of her with her eyes closed under the water. Then she would open her eyes suddenly and it would cut to black. I put way too much thought into these things. Ugh. I hope somebody likes my incoherent ramblings.

-~-~-~-~-Lonely Soul – UNKLE (LISTEN TO THIS ONE TOO! SERIOUSLY, IT'S AWESOME)


	10. The Fall

**Disclaimer: 'Teen Wolf' isn't mine. Shocking, right? But it's true. If there are any similarities in content or dialogue, it has probably originated with the show.**

**A huge thank you to chibichibi98, bagginsoftheshire666, SK-Scatenato, WhatsGoingOn, Ayine, Gee Brittany, darklou, Daenerys86, emmy72, Aurora Abbot, Doieversleep, Katiesgotagun, ForgeandGred4Ever, Damselindestress98, .heaRt, cateslikescats, Stilinski's Heart, TheMMMG, zvc56, Bookiee, KennedyRaye, carlie-the-dreamer, meels234, nessafly, Valkyrie101, artificial-paradises, Iwannabelikeme, Lia, Guest 1, M the Turtle, Guest 2, Tania, Just Anonymous, L. , TWsos12345, Atomicity, Undeniable Weirdness, Smiles in Shadows, Jaiime95, Shes-The-Proto-Type, Guest 3, Chibisemo, Micaela M, Female Whovian, Tania (again! Thank you!), Ericana, ellsosaurus, FetusPosey3, ParalyzedInHeaven, and YellowSubmarine93 for reviewing! Thank you so much! And thank you for the busy, busy BrittWitt16 who hasn't been able to work on her story for a while but should always be remembered!**

Chapter 10 – The Fall

"You know, Charlie, when you suggested that the two of us spend free period together, this wasn't exactly the first thing that came to mind. Or the second. Or the third. Actually it didn't even make the list."

Charlie couldn't blame Allison for having been surprised. Usually girls their age spent their free period chatting idly, doing a hair and makeup touchup, or, God forbid, actually studying. But she and Allison, well they weren't exactly your typical high school girls were they? Not any more at least. Which was why, as strange as it may seem, she considered it to be perfectly natural for them to be stomping through the woods with a duffle bag full of projectile weapons.

"Come on, Allison," Charlie drawled out sarcastically, narrowly avoiding face-planting in a pile of leaves as her toe caught a tree root. "The sun is shining, the birds are chirping...why wouldn't you want to go for a nice walk in the woods? It clears the sinuses and gives us some perspective. These days with all the electronics and fluorescent lighting—it's important for us to get perspective." Charlie sucked in a deep breath and sighed theatrically as she threw her arms out and spun around in a circle. "See. I'm soaking up the perspective already."

Allison let out a snort and trudged to a stop, readjusting the strap of the small, black duffle that hung from her shoulder. "Since when exactly have you cared about perspective?" Allison shot back, staring at her friend with raised eyebrows. "Up until today you referred to your free period as 'nap time'."

At the mention of her 'nap time', the benign expression on Charlie's face faltered slightly. This was bound to happen more than a few times in the coming weeks, her tripping right over one of the easy lies she had tossed out for Allison over the past few months. And there were so freaking many of them, she felt like she would always be surprised when one appeared. But that was why they were out here, wasn't it? Partially at least. It was so that the two of them could stumble their way back into a friendship with each other.

From the look on Allison's face, she had recognized the sudden shift in Charlie's demeanor, and she knew what it meant. 'Nap time' hadn't involved any actual napping. Well, sometimes it did, but more often than not it was a whole lot of whispering and researching and conspiring with the rest of Team Werewolf behind Allison's back. For a moment Charlie's heart seized up. The sudden fear that Allison would storm off and start hating her again shot through her like a jolt of electricity.

But Allison didn't storm off. A dark look crossed her face, but it only lingered for a moment. She exhaled sharply and shook the feeling off before pressing her lips together in a thin but determined smile. "It should be okay for us to stop here," Allison said, unslinging the bag from her shoulder and dropping it on the ground with a light thump. "We're far enough from the school and out of the way of any of the trails the cross-country team runs."

"And far enough out that we don't have to worry about your grandfather," Charlie pointed out through a bitter snort. "No offense or anything, but that guy seriously creeps me out."

Allison didn't respond. Instead she quickly unzipped the bag and pulled away the fabric, revealing its contents. Charlie peered in, observing what was inside, and let out a long, low whistle. It was Allison's archery set, all pretty and shiny and new. Usually she thought about bows and arrows in the context of 'Lord of the Rings' and 'Robin Hood', but the bow in that bag...it was a freaking Ferrari. It looked deadly.

"So how's the training going?" Charlie asked, feeling the sudden need to make conversation. "Is your dad pulling a whole Mr. Miyagi type thing? If he tries the 'wax on, wax off' lesson, that's a con. He's just trying to get you to wash his car." Allison let out a sigh and shook her head, making Charlie frown. "That good, huh?"

An almost passive-aggressive laugh burbled out of Allison's throat. "Well for starters he had me kidnapped."

"Excuse me?" Charlie demanded, drawing her eyebrows together in a quizzical frown. "Your dad had you kidnapped? That helps you become a hunter how exactly?"

Allison sighed, freeing her bow from the duffle and straightening to her feet. "I've always got to be prepared," she said with a shrug. "Some guys threw a bag over my head, drove me over to the Hale house, and tied me to a chair. It wasn't until they took the bag off my head that I even knew my dad had anything to do with it."

"Wow," Charlie murmured, folding her arms across her chest. "I've gotta say that is some top notch parenting right there. You better clear off a space on your mantle where the 'Father of the Year' trophy is going to go."

"He left me with an arrowhead," Allison murmured, suddenly getting slightly defensive. "I managed to cut myself out eventually. And anyways, he's right. I've got to learn to be prepared. Especially now."

Charlie scratched at her forehead, still slightly skeptical about the methods Allison's dad was using, but nodded in understanding anyway. She knew what Allison was alluding to. She had heard the story about four times now from two different people with varying amounts panic in their voice. Apparently Beacon Hills was now home to more than just werewolves. It was also home to giant snake-monsters with tails that could walk on ceilings. Charlie wasn't sure that she bought into the whole thing yet. It wasn't that she didn't believe Allison because she did—at this point she would believe pretty much anything and everything—but it just didn't seem quite real. Unfortunately for her, with the luck she seemed to have, it would start seeming very real very soon.

Lifting the bow up, Allison pulled back on the string, testing it out. She had this look of intense concentration on her face, almost like she was having a conversation with. Like the bow was telling her how to proceed from here. It was almost like the thing was her friend. Hell, in some ways it probably was. When the chips were down, it was the thing that she chose to depend on.

"You ever consider picking up a gun?" Charlie asked, surveying her friend carefully. "Your dad uses them. Kate us—" As soon as the name left her mouth, Charlie immediately stopped talking. It had just sort of slipped out, the casual reference to her aunt. Allison's hand tightened around the bow, but she didn't show any other signs of distress. Charlie cleared her throat uncomfortably and shifted on her feet before continuing. "The point is the silver bullet is kind of notorious."

Slowly, Allison allowed the bowstring to relax back into place and lowered the bow, laying it out on the palms of her hands like she was testing the weight. "I don't think so," she murmured, staring down at the thing. "Shooting a gun is too easy. You pull a trigger and that's it. There's no time to take it back. When you shoot a bow...I don't know, you just have to think about it. When you find your target, you have to actively make the decision to let the arrow go. And you know what the consequences are. People need to know what the consequences are."

After that, Allison seemed to disappear into herself a little bit. Charlie had noticed that look about her a few times over the past week, usually when the 'K' word was mentioned. Which meant that Charlie was now kicking herself for being such an emotionally constipated idiot. After a few moments, Allison shook her head and rolled her shoulders, like she was trying to shrug off the troubling thoughts. "Okay," Allison said, nodding at Charlie with a renewed sense of purpose. "Okay, so first things first. We want to get a sense of your natural stance—to see what your strengths and weaknesses are and where we can improve."

"Great," Charlie said, eager to move away from the emotional quagmire that she was stupid enough to wade into. "And how do we do that."

Allison bit her lip and looked around, a pensive expression on her face. "You're going to shoot that tree."

Charlie's eyebrows shot up and she let out a tiny scoff. "We're in a forest, Allison," Charlie drawled out sarcastically, waving her hands around. "You're going to have to be more specific."

Allison sighed heavily and rolled her eyes, but didn't respond. She moved behind Charlie and grabbed hold of her shoulders, turning in her in the right direction. "That one," she elaborated, pointing at an exceptionally and almost insultingly large pine.

Suddenly the bow and a single arrow were thrust into Charlie's hands, leaving her wondering fumbling with them and wondering what the hell she had to do. Well she knew the basics of what needed to be done, but this wasn't laser tag. It wasn't as simple as point and shoot. There were a number of factors that needed to be taken into account—strength, gravity, wind resistance. A thousand tiny things added up, leaving Charlie with a daunting task. As she lifted that bow—Allison's bow—she realized three things. One, she knew nothing about how this actually worked. Two, bow strings were actually really, really hard to pull back. Three, she was about to make a complete ass out of herself.

Charlie notched the arrow and held the bow with her right hand, drawing back the string with her left. She tried not to wince as she pulled the arrow back even though the still aching muscles of her abdomen strained and stretched over her ribs. Pursing her lips, Charlie blew out a careful breath, closed one eye, took aim, and released. The arrow sailed through the air. In the wrong direction. It missed the gigantic pine by about a foot and flew right past it, clattering ineffectively against the bark of a different tree and falling to the ground. It looked kind of pathetic, just lying there on the leaves like that. Charlie scrunched up her face and slowly turned around, looking to Allison for some sort of input, only to find her mouth hanging open slightly.

"How about we be less specific about which tree I was supposed to hit?" she said, turning to Allison with a sheepish smile. "I feel like that might slightly increase my odds."

It was a few moments before Allison managed to conjure up some sort of response. "Huh."

"Huh," Charlie repeated, bobbing her head. "I guess that's not exactly a ringing endorsement."

"It wasn't _that_ bad," Allison said, jerking her head to the side noncommittally. She stared after the arrow with a perplexed expression and planted her hands on her hips. "You've got the strength, that's for sure. You just need to work on your aim. And your stance. And some other stuff."

"Is that all?" Charlie said with a snort.

Allison sighed and rolled her eyes theatrically. "Charlie, you've been practicing for all of fifteen seconds," Allison shot back. "You can't automatically be awesome at absolutely everything."

"Why nooooooot?" Charlie whined, channeling her inner kindergartener.

An involuntary smile tugged at the corner of Allison's lips and she rolled her eyes again. She walked up to Charlie and crouched down to the ground, grabbing at her feet. "The first step in archery is to get the correct stance." She physically picked up one of Charlie's feet and pulled it forwards slightly. "You need to keep your feet a shoulder's length apart and adopt a square stance."

"Great," Charlie muttered, allowing herself to be positioned appropriately like a doll. "What is a 'square stance' exactly?"

Allison stood back up and gave Charlie a frustrated look. "What do you think I'm in the middle of showing you?" Allison muttered. "Has anybody ever told you that patience is not your strong suit?" She grabbed Charlie's waist, twisting it so that her hips were oriented in the right direction. All of the sudden a searing pain shot through her, making her grunt. Allison immediately released her, and her eyes flew up to Charlie's. "What was that?"

Charlie made a face and shrugged. "Nothing."

"Like hell," Allison scoffed. She reached forwards and grabbed the hem of Charlie's top, pulling it up to reveal her stomach. The bruises she had received the night of the full moon had faded slightly, but they were still there. The deep purple had just faded to a sickly, mottled green color. And it still looked pretty gross. Swearing to herself, Charlie yanked the shirt back down and avoided Allison's concerned glare. "Charlie!" she hissed. "What the hell happened?"

"That hunter guy that went after Isaac—he and I had a little disagreement," Charlie replied simply. "We exchanged words. And...punches."

"And you want me to teach you archery now?!" Allison demanded, staring at Charlie with slack-jawed disbelief. "Why not wait till you've fully healed?"

It was a good question. Why did she insist on going on this little field trip, today of all days?

Control. That's why. She needed to feel in control of something in her crapshoot of a life. Sometimes she felt like she was unraveling at the seams—that everything was spinning away from her. For all she knew, her mind wasn't her own anymore. Not fully at least. She had no idea how to get it back, but she could do something. She could do this. If she could learn some way to defend herself physically—something new—then maybe she could learn to defend herself mentally as well. But she couldn't exactly tell Allison that, could she?

"Stress relief," she answered simply. "The video games aren't really doing it for me anymore. Fake shooting at random crap isn't satisfying. I want to actually shoot at random crap."

"Charlie—"

"Allison," Charlie interrupted, looking pointedly at the girl. "There are hunters and werewolves are wandering around the city, there's a new lizard monster attacking people, I made a B on that history quiz—"

"Charlie, that was a pop quiz," Allison admonished. "You can't seriously—"

"AND," Charlie declared, lifting a hand in the air, "my aunt is now dating my economics teacher. I don't know about you, but all that kinda makes me want to shoot something."

Charlie quirked up a single eyebrow in Allison's direction, challenging her to offer up some sort of contradiction. Allison narrowed her eyes and opened her mouth to respond, but, as predicted, no sound came out. Instead she just snapped her mouth shut again and shook her head. "You really want to do this?"

"Given the fact that I asked you repeatedly," Charlie drawled out, "I'm leaning towards yes."

Allison let out a sigh of defeat and scratched at her forehead. "Fine," she muttered. "Fine."

A grin spread across Charlie's face and she pumped a fist in the air. "Score!"

After that, Allison followed through on the promise Charlie had extracted from her while she was still in her early morning sleep-addled state. Stance, aim, possible intervening factors—she taught Charlie all of it. Or as much as she could within a period of twenty minutes. Turns out Allison was actually a pretty damn good teacher. Patient, clear, concise. In those twenty minutes Charlie had improved markedly. That still didn't mean that she was good, but she was getting better. But as time dragged on, Allison started getting a little distracted. Her hand kept reaching for the back pocket where she kept her phone. It didn't take much to figure out what was going on behind those pretty brown eyes of hers.

"Go ahead," Charlie said as she notched another arrow.

Allison looked up at her, furrowing her eyebrows in confusion. "What do you mean?"

"Really, Allison?" Charlie smirked. "You gonna play that game? Go find your boy-toy and have a little fun."

"It's fine," Allison said, waving her hand dismissively. "I'll see him later."

"It's okay," Charlie insisted. "Go ahead."

Allison pressed her lips together in a thin line. She began bouncing up and down on the balls of her feet and bit her lip, glancing back in the direction of the school with a conflicted look on her face. "You sure?"

"Absolutely," Charlie proclaimed, accompanied by a confident nod. "But do you mind if I stay out here for a while longer. I'll get all this stuff back to you after classes."

"Y—yeah," Allison said. "Yeah, okay, sure." She turned around and ran a couple of steps back towards the school but then stopped, looking back at Charlie over her shoulder. "Hey, I'll see you in gym class later. Apparently Finstock got us a climbing wall."

Charlie clenched her jaw, and gave Allison a salute. "Of course. Wouldn't want to miss out on chillin' with my aunt's new boyfriend. Sounds awesome. A dream come true."

Allison snorted loudly and returned to salute. "Have fun working out all your frustrations."

It took about two seconds for Allison to melt into the forest, leaving Charlie alone. She jogged forwards, collecting the forgotten arrows that lay strewn across the forest floor before resuming her previous position and dropping them in the duffle. Sighing to herself, Charlie fished her iPod out of her pocket and shoved the earphones in ears and began blasting music. She snatched up one of the arrows and took aim at that same stupid pine tree. But that time its bark was notched and pitted by all of the glancing shots she had thrown at it, but not one shot had stuck. Not yet, anyway. Allison had said something about how she took aim—about how she timed her shots. 'Shoot between the heartbeats'. Well Charlie didn't have that level of skill yet, but she could shoot between the notes of a song.

"Once more with feeling," Charlie mumbled to herself. She lifted the bow again and pulled the string back, letting the arrow fly. And for some reason her hand chose that exact moment to start cramping up. "Dammit," she hissed, shaking her hand out. The muscles tightened rigidly, causing her fingers to just out in odd directions. She swore under her breath and began to rub at her hand, massaging the muscles back into their intended configuration. It was a while before she looked up, only to see the arrow firmly embedded in the wood of the tree. Charlie's face split into a wide grin. "Nice."

A few more shots, a few more arrows sticking out of the tree, and Charlie was suddenly feeling very pleased with herself. When she ran out of arrows, she moved towards her target. It took all of her strength to wrench those arrows out of the tree, and by the time she was done with it her hands were covered in bark or sap. She tucked the arrows under her arm and wiped her hands on her jeans—Lydia would have had a heart attack—before marching back to that same spot. Lather, rinse, repeat. She drew the back the string and prepared to let the arrow fly, but before she did she heard something above the music pumping in her ears. A sound that definitely was not characteristic of an empty forest.

Charlie spun around in the direction of the noise, bow still drawn, only to find one Isaac Lahey standing there, doing a slow clap. Swearing loudly, she let the bow go slack and ripped the earphones out of her ears. "God dammit, Isaac," she growled. "I almost shot you!"

Isaac sighed heavily and smirked at her, an expression that was still seemed oddly foreign when on his face. He shoved his hands in his pockets and ducked his head slightly before taking a few steps towards her. "Oh, I don't know about that," he murmured. "I mean, you might be getting better, but you're not quite there yet."

"Okay, judge-y," Charlie scoffed, waving her hand in his direction. "I don't recall asking your opinion. What are you doing here exactly?"

"Looking for you," he said, gesturing in her general direction. "I needed to talk to you about something."

"You needed to talk to me about something?" Charlie repeated, raising her eyebrows at him. "How the hell did you find me?" Isaac opened his mouth to reply, but before he could Charlie lifted a hand to cut him off. "You know what—don't tell me. I'm getting tired of being told that I have 'a smell'. It's creepy. And it makes me sound like a garbage dump. Or a carton of milk that's gone bad."

Isaac shrugged his shoulders sheepishly. "Well, I wouldn't put it like that. It's more of a scent. An aroma, even."

"An aroma?" Charlie shot back, curling her lip slightly. "That makes me sound like somebody's lunch." She carefully dropped the bow and arrow on the ground and folded her arms across her chest before turning back towards Isaac. "So how's being a fugitive treating you?" she asked, eyeing him with no small degree of curiosity. "Are you alright? I mean did you find a place to stay and everything?"

That tiny smile returned to Isaac's face and he scratched at the back of his neck, seeming oddly self-conscious. "Um, yeah," he nodded. "Derek's got this place where we're staying. It's at the abandoned Railroad Depot."

"Seriously?" Charlie said through a snort. "The Railroad Depot? That sounds like a recipe for tetanus. Though that's probably not something you've got to worry about anymore with the whole 'never getting sick' thing."

"Well it's not exactly cozy, if that's what you're asking," Isaac chuckled. "But it's not all that bad."

"Wow," Charlie said, pacing back and forth a little. "So Derek went and found himself a Batcave, then? Well at least he chose a place that suits his personality." She stopped pacing and spun on her heel, facing Isaac directly. "Speaking of the brooding wonder, wouldn't he be kind of pissed that you came this close to the school to talk to me? In case you haven't noticed, I kind of annoy the shit out of him."

"Yeah," Isaac laughed. "Yeah, you do. A lot. Whenever someone mentions your name around him he gets—" he gestured in the general direction of his own face "—he gets this 'why me?' look and rolls his eyes."

"Of course he does."

"But he respects you," Isaac piled on, sounding weirdly apologetic. "I mean he respects your opinion. It annoys him when you're right, though. Apparently you're right a lot."

Charlie snorted to herself, but then leveled Isaac with a serious look. "Isaac, what are you doing lurking around here? You could get caught."

"Wha—I was not lurking," Isaac protested.

"You were kind of lurking," she shot back, holding up her thumb and forefinger to indicate.

Isaac opened his mouth again to protest, but Charlie raised her eyebrows at him, essentially cutting him off. He exhaled sharply and scratched at his forehead before continuing. "Look, I just needed to—to say thank you. For everything."

The earnestness in Isaac's eyes was almost off-putting. She furrowed her eyebrows and wrapped her arms around her waist, trying to make herself smaller or even disappear. "If you're talking about you busting out of lockup, you really don't have to thank me. You took care of that pretty much on your own. If anything I got in the way."

"No you didn't," Isaac said, taking a step towards her. And then something in his face changed. He paused for a moment before finally looking back up at her again. "And anyway, that's not what I meant. That's not all that I meant anyway. I—I was talking about before I got arrested. Before all...this."

Charlie scrunched up her face in an expression of confusion. "Still not sure I'm following you."

"You noticed," Isaac said simply. When Charlie didn't respond, he took yet another tiny step towards her. "You noticed something was wrong," he reiterated. "W—with me, I mean. Nobody else did, and it took you like two days. And you...you told me that I could come to you if I needed to talk to someone. That means a lot. I just needed you to know that I appreciate it."

Charlie bit her lip and suddenly found herself wishing that she was anywhere but in that exact spot. Over the past couple of months she had made some pretty big strides, but sometimes she still found herself becoming uncomfortable with genuine human emotion. So, in true form, she let out an uncomfortable chuckle and pointed at him awkwardly. "Well, you...are...welcome. I guess. That's what people normally say, right? You're welcome?"

"Yeah," Isaac said, that oddly easy smirk finding its way back to his face. "That's normally what people say." Then for some reason his head perked up and his eyebrows pulled together curiously. "You should probably get going."

"Um, why?" Charlie murmured.

"Because the school bell just rang."

There wasn't even time for Charlie to make a crack about how annoying that superior look on his face was. After the spectacularly loud cry of 'oh shit', she was shoving everything into the duffle bag and when she had managed to zip up the bag and get to her feet, Isaac had disappeared. She was standing alone in the forest again, like he had never been there at all. Great. He was taking a page out of Derek's book now. Freaking werewolves.

Charlie practically sprinted back to the school, narrowly avoiding more than one headlong collision with various trees. It took about three minutes for her to actually manage to get back on school campus. Immediately she went for the parking lot, stowing Allison's archery gear in the trunk of her car just as the second bell rang. Which meant that she was late for class. Again. And apparently her tardiness was becoming frequent enough that it wasn't even a surprise anymore. When she skidded into the French room, slightly sweaty and her breaths coming out in heavy pants, Ms. Morell barely even acknowledged it. She just shot Charlie an 'I don't approve of this type of behavior' glance and allowed Charlie to take her seat.

Was all of this sustainable? At first she thought she could keep up with all of this stuff and school and have some semblance of a life, but the way things were going, it didn't quite look that way. Peter and the hallucinations she had been having—she had taken those things and put them in a tiny box in the corner of her mind where she never, ever had to think about them. Now, though? That residual ache that she felt in her stomach every freaking time she breathed served as a constant reminder that she could be losing it. It didn't help that with each passing night she was getting more and more sleep deprived. It had gotten to the point where she felt her eyes drooping in class.

Charlie never fell asleep in class. Ever. Sure she might ignore the professor from time to time when she was distracted or bored, but she had never fallen asleep. Except for that one time in the third grade when they were counting macaroni, but that was in protest. If you're still counting macaroni in the third grade, your educational system has already failed you. But that wasn't the point. The point was she had to keep fighting an enemy she couldn't see as well as the one that she could. It felt like she kept climbing and climbing, but it was completely useless. She never got anywhere. And to top it all off, French class ended and she was sent to the gym, which meant that she now found herself staring at a physical manifestation of her own metaphor.

Finstock's stupid climbing wall. Yet another one of the ridiculous things this place came up with to 'enrich the experience' of their students. Like shipping in a giant plastic wall was going to make any difference in the morale of the student body. What exactly was the point? There wasn't one! It was literally an _exercise_ in futility. And now she was internally monologuing bad puns. She blamed Finstock for those stupid puns. Stupid Finstock and his stupid face and his stupid climbing wall and his stupid decision to start having the hots for her freaking aunt.

Okay, maybe she was overreacting a bit. The whole thing actually looked kind of entertaining. Scott and Allison certainly seemed to be enjoying themselves, though that might have more to do with the flirting than the climbing.

"So what do you think?" a voice said, interrupting her reverie.

"Huh?" Charlie mumbled indistinctly, looking in the direction of the sound. What she was met with was a highly scandalized looking Stiles.

"Wha—have you not been listening this entire time?" he demanded, spluttering loudly. "Seriously? I mean I just laid out all of the arguments in a—in a very clear and concise way, and you just went and missed the whole thing! That—that is just plain rude is what that is what that is. I mean, come on, Oswin—"

"Okay," Charlie interrupted, holding up a hand to cut him off. "How's about you stop yelling at me for not knowing what you're talking about and actually tell me what you were talking about."

Stiles stood there, eyes narrowed and mouth hanging open slightly, considering whether or not to keep on berating her for her inattention. Then he snapped his mouth shut and looked away from her, folding his arms across his chest. Charlie waited for a few a few moments for him to actually say something, but he didn't. Letting out a scoff, she rolled her eyes heavily and smacked him in the chest. "Really?" she demanded. "Are you actually sulking right now?"

"Wha—I am not sulking," Stiles defended. "I do not sulk. There is no sulking happening right here—" he waved his hands around himself "—here in this general vicinity!"

"Are you sure about that?" Charlie shot back. "Because you refusing to talk like this...it seems kind of like sulking."

"There is no sulking!" Stiles hissed. "What I was talking about isn't exactly relevant anymore. There's no point in repeating all over again! It'd just sound stupid."

"And since when has that ever stopped you?"

Stiles glowered at her for a few moments, and she simply raised her eyebrows back, waiting expectantly. As per usual, his resolve crumbled and he let out a frustrated sigh. "Fine," he said snappishly. "If...if Godzilla and King Kong got into it, who do you think would win?" As soon as the sentence left his lips, Charlie scrunched up her face into a disbelieving and slightly judgmental expression, making Stiles nod knowingly. "See?" he said, pointing at her. "I told you it would seem stupid."

"Of course it seems stupid, Stiles!" Charlie groaned. "I mean what the hell kind of question is that?"

"Um, an awesome one?!"

"Try a pointless one," she snorted back. "Even more pointless than the last one. I mean, come on! Godzilla vs. King Kong? I wouldn't even go so far as to call that a debate. There's nothing to talk about. Godzilla would flatten King Kong inside of like ten seconds. Probably less."

On the climbing wall, Scott and Allison both rappelled down the wall, landing neatly on the two blue mats. Stiles and Charlie moved forwards a bit, slowly shuffling to the front of the group milling around the wall with their shoulders knocking into each other. "You're being awfully dismissive, doncha think?" Stiles grumbled. "I mean you didn't even think about it for a second."

"I didn't have to think about for a second Stiles," Charlie replied. "King Kong climbed the Empire State Building. Godzilla is the size of the Empire State Building. And he spits fire. Case closed."

"Well that's just plain size-ist."

"Size-ist?" Charlie snapped, planting her hand on her hip as she glared at him. "Really?"

"Um, yeah?" Stiles said, waving his hands about. "Small means stealthy! King Kong could sneak up on Godzilla and—"

"And what, Stiles? Give him a monster-sized paper cut?"

"No!" Stiles exclaimed vehemently. "He could like gouge out Godzilla's eyes or something!"

Stiles took his index and middle finger and hooked them slightly, miming gouging out somebody's eyes. They got a little too close to her face, forcing her to slap them away, probably a little harder than she needed to. Stiles let out a yelp of protest and was probably about to whine at her like he usually did, but before he could the coach's voice rang out through the gym. "Okay, who's next?" he shouted looking around at the crowd of grey-clad students. A single hand shot up, which Finstock promptly ignored. "Anybody?" he asked, continuing to scan the group. "Seriously, anybody? Put your hand down Greenberg, everybody here knows you have the upper body strength of a toddler. We're not doing this again. Not after last time! Do I have to remind you what happened last time?"

That single hand slowly retracted back down, disappearing into the sea of grey. After that, they might as well have been listening to a chorus of crickets. Stiles turned to her and shrugged, jerking his head in the direction of the wall. "You want to—"

"Oh my God!" Lydia's disembodied voice interrupted loudly. Charlie blinked and turned around to see the red-head moving towards her, winding her way through the other gym clothes-clad students, trying very hard to avoid touching any of them. It almost wanted to make Charlie laugh, actually, seeing Lydia in gym clothes like this. She saw it every school day and it never stopped being funny. The uncomfortable way that she was walking, you would have thought that everybody else there had been steeped in bedbugs or something. The only thing that made it funnier was the fact that she was actually wearing sneakers. She walked up to Charlie, her nose wrinkled in an expression of distaste. "I made sure it took me over twenty minutes to get changed into this ridiculous getup. How did I manage to not miss this?"

"You failed to take into account the laziness of the average high school student," Charlie replied, glancing back up at Stiles who for some reason suddenly appeared immensely uncomfortable—all fidgety and stuff. "Speaking of which," she continued, jerking her thumb over her shoulder in the direction of the wall, "I've got to—"

"Oh, you're not leaving me," Lydia declared, linking her arm through Charlie's definitively. "If I've got to put up with this, I'm at least going to be doing it with somebody whose company I find reasonably tolerable."

"Lydia, I don't think—"

"Stilinski!" Finstock's voice announced, reverberating against the walls of the gym. "Erica! Congratulations, the both of you have graciously volunteered to be the next two people to climb this wall!"

Charlie turned to Stiles to apologize, but he smiled and waved his hand dismissively, heading to the blue mat where he and a frizzy-haired blonde girl from her chem class—Erica—both put on their harnesses. Once again, for the thousandth time in the space of a week, Charlie felt like she had done something wrong—something stupid. Was this why they called it having a 'crush'? Because you had the perpetual, crushing feeling that you were screwing up the relationship at every possible opportunity? He glanced back at her, giving her a thumbs up, which she returned, before starting to climb the wall. And then something weird happened. The girl next to him—Erica—she glanced over her shoulder as well, staring at her with an expression Charlie couldn't quite place. All she could say about it was that it wasn't particularly appreciative. Charlie frowned at the girl, trying to gauge her attitude and why exactly she was being looked at like a chewed piece of gun that had just been stepped on, but yet again she was interrupted by the sound of footsteps approaching.

"Hey!" Allison breathed out as she jogged up to Lydia and Charlie, a resplendent smile on her face. "How's it going?"

"Well it's not going _that_ well," Lydia replied, waving a single finger in Allison's smiling face. "What exactly is making you so happy?"

"Wha—nothing!" Allison said defensively, flushing a bit. "There's nothing."

But Allison was fooling herself if she thought that Lydia was actually paying attention to her. Nope, at this point all of her attentions were focused on the righteous rage she was directing at the climbing wall. "I mean what is the point of this?" she demanded, waving her hand at Stiles and Erica. "We're climbing up a ten foot wall so we can climb back down a ten foot wall. I just got a manicure."

"You have a weekly standing appointment at the nail salon," Charlie pointed out. "You always 'just had' a manicure."

Lydia flashed her a disparaging glare. "Again, Charlie, not the point."

"Then what is your point exactly?" Allison said, raising her eyebrows.

After that Lydia launched into a long and in-depth monologue as to exactly how these sort of mandated physical activities were wholly unacceptable, but Charlie began to tune her out. Instead, she watched the climbing wall, observing as Stiles made his way up the wall. He was moving quite quickly actually, like he was trying to prove something. This could become a problem—her inability to not look at him. Jesus, was she becoming a stalker-ish? She was, wasn't she?

Stiles managed to make it to the top of the wall fairly easily. There was one point when his foot slipped and he ended up flailing a bit, but Charlie pretended not to see that for both of their sakes. He repelled down the wall and landed, throwing his hands in the air in a gesture of victory. He kind of looked like a female gymnast who had just 'stuck the landing', not that Charlie would ever tell him that. She chuckled at the expression of extreme self-satisfaction, shooting him a double thumbs-up and making him grin widely. But almost immediately it was drawn somewhere else.

Erica. She and Stiles had started climbing at the exact same time, but while Stiles had managed to climb to the top of the wall, she had barely made it five feet off the ground. Charlie narrowed her eyes at the girl. Looking at her carefully it didn't take more than half a second to realize that there was something wrong. It had been a couple minutes before she moved from her spot, and from what Charlie could see, she was trembling with fear. And apparently she wasn't the only one who had noticed. A steady stream of whispers began to flow between the students, slowly getting louder.

"Is she okay?" Charlie inquired, talking more to herself than to anybody else.

"What?" Lydia asked stupidly, turning away from her conversation with Allison.

"Erica," Charlie said, taking a small step towards the wall. "She looks like she's having a panic attack."

Almost as soon as the words left her mouth, the quiet whimpers Erica was giving off turned into panicked sobs. Her forehead creasing in concern, Charlie pushed her way through the rest of the few students in front of her, making a beeline for Stiles who was still strapped into his harness, watching Erica as well. "Hey," she breathed out, making his glance at her for a moment before looking back up at the trembling blonde. "What happened?"

"I—I don't know," he said, shrugging a bit.

Within seconds the other students had crowded around the wall as well, pushing in to get as good a view as possible. Some of them were worried, most of them were just curious, and much to her disgust, Charlie found one of them—Aaron Harrison—laughing to himself and filming the whole thing on his phone. That guy had a face made for punching.

"Erica?!" Coach Finstock shouted at her. "Are you dizzy? Is it vertigo?"

"Vertigo is a dysfunction of the vestibular system of the inner ear," Lydia chimed in, no small degree of contempt in her voice as she addressed the coach. "She's just freaking out."

"Wow, Lydia," Charlie said sarcastically, sneering slightly at her friend. "Your compassion is just blowing me away right now."

The coach looked slightly abashed at Lydia's instruction, but turned back to his anxiety-ridden student. "Erica!"

"I—I'm fine!" she squeaked back. But it wasn't very convincing. Her voice was small and thin, and the words came haltingly, like she was forcing them out through panicked breaths. Nope. She was definitely not 'fine'.

"Coach, maybe it's not safe," Allison murmured, appearing at the coach's shoulder. "You know she's epileptic."

Flabbergasted was the best way to describe Finstock's subsequent expression. Or maybe bamboozled. Or nonplussed. Whichever word could best describe the shocked, bugged out eyes and gaping mouth, that was what he was. "Wh—why does nobody tell me this stuff?!" He turned back to Erica with even more concern than before. "Erica! You're fine! Just—just kick off from the wall! There's—there's a mat to catch you! Come on."

Charlie actually held her breath as she watched. Slowly, Erica leaned backwards in her harness. She was barely clutching onto those small, fake, brightly colored rocks, but she couldn't seem to make her fingertips let go. Finally, the weight of her body leaning back was to much to support and her fingers slipped. Erica flailed for a moment, grasping for the hand-holds, but she had fallen too far back. Instead she seized onto the rope connected to her harness, holding onto it like it was her lifeline as she was slowly lowered to the ground. She jolted a bit as soon as her feet touched the mat, but Finstock was there to put a comforting hand on her arm and keep her steady.

"See, you're fine, you're on the ground," he said with an uncharacteristic degree of gentleness in his voice. "There you go. Shake it off. You're fine."

As soon as her feet touched the ground, the attitude of the entire room changed. It was like there was this blanket agreement that while Erica was still potentially in danger, everybody would be quiet and concerned—worried about their classmate's safety. The minute the danger was gone, though, they turned back into that stereotypical high school nightmare, laughing and giggling with each other. Charlie noticed Erica's eyes water slightly and watched with regret as the girl pushed her way through the crowd, making her way back to the locker rooms. A big part of her wanted to go make sure that Erica was okay, but she knew that any extra attention—even if kindly meant—would just make things worse. Pity never helped. She knew that much from experience.

When Erica disappeared from the gym, so did the whispers and everything passed pretty much as normally as possible. Kids talked idly while others scaled the wall, guys stared at the girls' asses and vice versa, though the girls didn't wolf-whistle nearly as much. Mostly everybody just stood around doing absolutely nothing. You know, your usual gym class.

Finally, that final bell rang releasing from that hellhole of an institution that was colloquially referred to as 'school'. Not to be outdone by the P.A. system, Finstock blew the whistle that was permanently glued to his lip. "Alright!" he shouted, glaring at the students. "You are officially not my problem for the next—" he glanced at his watch "—fifteen and half hours." He looked at them expectantly, but nobody moved, confused by the sudden and completely unnecessary declaration. Finstock scrunched up his face, looking at them all with an expression of confusion. "What the hell are you waiting for?! Just because you don't have anything to do with your spare time except stare at your computer screen doesn't mean I don't! Stop wasting my time and get your asses out of this gym and off school property! I don't want to be looking at any of your faces any more—especially yours Greenburg!"

After that Charlie heard the collective grumblings of the class and the crowd around the wall began to disperse, girls and guys splitting off into groups as they headed back to their respective locker rooms. Charlie sighed tiredly, trudging towards the locker room. She was ready for a night of procrastination and sleep. What little sleep she could get, anyway. But when Lydia strode up, dragging Allison with her and linking her arm through Charlie's, the chances of that seemed to dwindle significantly.

"So what are we doing tonight?" Lydia demanded, smiling radiantly at her friends, neither of whom were particularly enthusiastic.

"It's a week night, Lydia," Charlie said through a yawn.

"And that would be a perfectly reasonable explanation," Lydia nodded. "If we were eighty and eating liquefied food because normal food was too hard on our dentures. But we are young and we are hot and we are—"

"Sleep deprived," Charlie finished for her. "Seriously, Lydia, if we did anything tonight I would be falling asleep two hours in."

"God, you are a constant disappointment," Lydia said lightly. She looked in Allison's direction next, but the brunette shook her head as well.

"I can't," Allison muttered, shooting Charlie a knowing glance. "I've got a...a family thing."

It didn't take much for Charlie to realize that 'family thing' meant 'crazy hunter training', but Lydia wasn't gifted with that degree of understanding. To her 'family thing' meant a bunch old people sitting around a table covered with lace doilies, having tea and crumpets. Which, apparently, was not acceptable. "Come on!" Lydia whined. "You are two of the hottest girls in this entire school. How can you possibly be so boring?"

It actually took some effort for Charlie to contain the snort Lydia's last statement inspired, but somehow she managed. And then Lydia launched into yet another lecture about how horrifically disappointing both she and Allison were. Charlie tried to listen to it for a while, but eventually began to tune it out. Her long list of failings had been recited so many times, it had kind of turned into white noise. And then there was the fact that her attention was drawn in by something else.

A few yards off from her own trio, Charlie saw a group of three boys huddled around a phone and sniggering to themselves. Their backs were facing her, but Charlie recognized the guy on the far left with his blonde hair and excessive amounts of hair gel. That was Aaron Harrison. And if he was laughing at anything, you could be damned sure if was at someone else's expense. Charlie's lip curled into an involuntary sneer and she withdrew her arm from Lydia's, breaking off in another direction.

"Um, Charlie?" Lydia shouted after her. "Where the hell do you thing you're going?"

"I'll meet up with you in the locker room," Charlie said, waving her off as she continued towards the congress of idiots. "Give me a few minutes."

As she approached, she could hear the tinny sound of a girl whimpering from the small speakers of the phone. Immediately she felt her muscles go stiff and she began grinding her teeth together. "Look at that," she heard that irritating voice say. "I mean, come on! Could you get more pathe—"

But he didn't get the chance to finish that thought. It was soon replaced by some whimpering of his own. Busting one of her old favorites, she reached for his free hand and grabbed hold of his thumb, twisting back in a way that forced him to bend over at the waist lest that thumb be dislocated. "O—Oswin!" he yelped. "What are you doing?"

"Hey, Harrison," she drawled out casually. She flashed the two other lacrosse meatheads a smile while the two of them looked at each other stupidly, both unwilling to physically confront a girl. Which meant that she was free to snatch up the phone that Aaron had so conveniently dropped at her feet. "Now what do we have here?" she mused passive-aggressively. She frowned at the screen as she saw the image of Erica struggling on that tiny screen. "Aaron, I didn't know you were an amateur photographer," she said in a tone that was so sickly sweet it was threatening. Scowling, she punched the few necessary buttons necessary and the image disappeared from the screen.

Charlie released her hold on Aaron's thumb and he stumbled a few steps back, rubbing at his sore hand and glaring at her like he was trying to set her on fire. The guy had no shame, but apparently he could get embarrassed pretty freaking easily. Apparently he had given up hitting on her and had moved on to hating her. "Bitch," he spat angrily. "You're lucky you're hot or nobody would—"

"So sorry," Charlie interrupted sarcastically, staring down at the screen and hitting random buttons. "As a female I am obviously _terrible_ with technology. I seem to have deleted that video. And half your contacts. Also it looks like you've got some compromising pictures on here. I hope my fingers don't slip and accidentally text them to great aunt Margaret. Oh, dear, the incompetency!"

At that point Charlie threw his phone at him probably a little harder than necessary causing it to the clatter to the ground. Aaron swore loudly and swooped down to pick the thing up before she could do anything else. "You could have broken the screen!"

"I didn't?" Charlie drawled in a disappointed tone. "Damn."

Aaron's eyes narrowed into slits and he took a threatening step towards her. "I'm gonna—"

"Oswin!" Finstock's voice echoed through the gym. "My office! Now!"

Charlie spun around to see Finstock standing on the other side of the gym at the entrance of said office, staring in her direction with his hands on his hips. She let out a pitiful whine that almost sounded like dying cat and her face scrunched up into an expression of distaste. Detention was one thing. It was unpleasant, but bearable. A one-on-one with Finstock? That was the absolute last thing she wanted to be subjected to right now. The universe hated her. That had to be it. She must have done some pretty terrible shit in a past life because karma was kind of kicking her ass right now.

"Well how about that?" Aaron said, folding his arms across his chest and smirking. "The princess is in trouble."

Charlie let out a scoff and rolled her eyes. "Shut up, Aaron. I know you wet the bed until you were ten."

With that she spun on her heel and walked towards the coach, leaving Aaron Harrison—who had since turned into spluttering, yammering mess—in her wake. The closer she got to Finstock and the gym-side entrance to his office, the more hesitation she felt. Hesitation which manifested on her face in the form of an elaborate wince, one that became more pronounced with each step she took. Finstock on the other hand...he was smiling. A smile that got bigger and bigger until it became something bordering on psychotic. When Charlie approached him he reached for the doorknob and allowed it to swing open, gesturing for her to come inside. "Ladies first."

Charlie frowned in the face of his politeness, but did as he said and ducked through the door.

"Wait here," Finstock ordered. Then he disappeared through the other door to his office—the one that led to the boys' locker room—for a few moments. Leaving Charlie with a few minutes to contemplate her fate. When he returned, she immediately began to defend herself.

"Look," she said as she entered, "if this was about the things that just happened with Aaron Harrison, I can understand why that might look bad but there were definitely extenuating circum—"

Finstock circled around his desk and look at her with an expression of confusion. "Aaron Harris—God, no it's not because of him," he said with a dismissive laugh. He collapsed back in his chair with an exhausted sigh and gestured for her to do the same. "Harrison—you've got to be kidding me. I hate that kid. The only reason I ever put him on the field is so I can watch him get his ass kicked. I'll tell you Charlie, there is no joy that can compare to watching a dumbass like Harrison getting the crap kicked out of him." He leaned towards her, resting his elbows on the table and giving her a funny look. "Did you know he wet the bed till he was ten? It makes a weird sort of sense if you think about it."

Then Finstock started bobbing his head and narrowing his eyes pensively. Charlie sank down in her seat and shifted uncomfortably. "Am I supposed to be thinking about it?" she asked, eyeing him warily.

Finstock shot her a funny look. "Why would you be thinking about it?"

Sighing heavily, Charlie ran her hands down her face. Given the direction the conversation, detention would have been the preferable outcome. "If this isn't about Harrison, what is it about?"

Almost as soon as she stated the question out loud, she wanted to take it back. It was like the words were floating in the air above her head and she was reaching up to snatch them back, but couldn't quite make it. "This is about laying some ground rules," he said, causing Charlie to start making that dying cat noise again. Finstock gave her yet another weird look, but continued talking. "Now that Melody and I are—

A strangled cry of protest erupted from Charlie's mouth and she began shaking her head vigorously. "No. No, no, no. I can not be having this conversation right now. Can you just give me a detention instead? Or suspend me? I'd be totally fine with both of those options."

"Really?" Finstock said, looking slightly offended. "You'd rather be suspended than talk to me. Well, I'd like to say that's a new low but an incident in high sch—you know what—that's not important. I mean, we've already got stuff in common. You like your aunt, I like your au—"

"I will literally pay you to stop talking right now," Charlie begged, planting her hands on the desk and looking at him seriously. "I've only got like thirty bucks in my locker, but I can stop by an ATM!"

"You're trying to bribe me?" Finstock demanded incredulously. "It's not the nineties anymore! I—" he pointed at himself "—I have my integrity." Then he jerked his head to the side, seeming to reconsider. "Sort of. Look...Charlotte, I'm—"

"Oh, God," Charlie whined, looking around the room for some sort of escape. "There's got to be something around here that I can kill myself with. Do you think I could impale myself on that trophy?"

Finstock snapped his fingers and pointed at her angrily. "Hey! That is last year's state championship lacrosse trophy. That is sacred. You leave that alone or I swear I'm going to start using some very harsh language!"

The two of them sat there glaring at each other for a fairly long time, probably with unnervingly similar facial expressions. Somewhere in the middle of it, it seemed to turn into a staring contest, with neither of them blinking. The clock seated on his wall began to tick loudly, making sure that they were both painfully aware of exactly how much time was passing. First the eyes began to itch and to water. Then Finstock's left eye began to do this weird twitchy thing. Finally let out a strangled cry of frustration and threw his hands in the air. "Okay, this—this is ridiculous. Look...Charlotte...I'm not going away. I'm sticking to you like—"

"An incurable disease?" Charlie mumbled

"Yeah! Fine! Whatever!" he shouted, waving his hands around a bit. And then he let them collapse back on the desk. "Look I know this has got to be awkward for you—your aunt dating a teacher. I've got to say, your aunt—" he let out a disbelieving laugh and shook his head a bit "—that woman is incredible. I mean, whoa!"

Charlie's hands instinctively gripped the armrests harder so that her knuckles strained against the skin, turning them white. "You're not exactly making me any less uncomfortable," she muttered.

But Finstock didn't seem to hear her. Or he wasn't paying attention. Or he didn't care. "Okay, first off," he said, holding up a single finger, "first off she's insanely beautiful. But not only that, she's smart, funny, and successful? It's almost ridiculous. But I do know one thing." He lowered that finger he was waving around so it was pointing directly at her. "You. Melody loves you more than pretty much anything in the world, even with that mouth you've got on you. Which means that if you don't want her to date me, she's not going to." Finstock clasped his hands together and fixed her with a look she didn't recognize from him. A serious one. "So here's the deal. That woman deserves to be obscenely happy. I think I can help with that. Right now what I'm asking is for you to let me make her happy. Is that something you can do?"

To say that Charlie was surprised at his words would be an understatement. Though in retrospect she probably shouldn't have. Sure the man was absurd, but as much as he mocked and ridiculed his students, he did care about them. When the chips were down, he would be there for any of them. Except Greenberg. He definitely hated Greenberg. Charlie probably should have told him that—she should have had a nice, heartfelt moment with the guy—but she wasn't exactly good at heartfelt moments. "I already told Mel it was cool," she said abruptly, shrugging at him.

It was kind of like he had been Finstock had been hit over the head by a giant club covered in some sort of soft material. The eyes widened, the jaw went slack, and his face carried a general air of bemusement. "Huh. How about that?"

"Yup," Charlie nodded. "How about that?"

"I had this whole speech thing prepared to," he mused to himself. "It was going to be pretty moving actually. I wrote a haiku. You don't think I could..." He looked at Charlie, almost asking for permission to launch into his speech. Charlie just stared back blankly. He narrowed his eyes, trying to gauge her reaction, but she was a brick wall. "Right," he quipped, looking slightly disappointed. "The moment's passed."

He waited a few more seconds for her to contradict him. She didn't.

"Alright," Finstock barreled on. "Which brings me back to the first point. I'm supposed to have something called—" Apparently he couldn't quite find the word, because he kept snapping his fingers and staring out into the distance.

"Professional responsibility?" Charlie suggested, raising her eyebrows at him.

Finstock snapped his fingers one more time, this time definitively, and pointed at Charlie. "Exactly. Professional responsibility. So this is what we're going to do. In school, no special treatment. You're not getting any extra points on tests, you don't get to cut class, and if you're lookin' for a hall pass, don't come to me."

"You literally just eliminated all the positives from this situation."

"And," Finstock continued, "when you're here you'll have to call me Mr. Finstock. Or Coach Finstock. Or just coach. Or sir. But when we're outside of school, you can think of me as Uncl—"

"If you tell me to call you 'Uncle Bobby' I am leaving right now," Charlie hissed.

Finstock made a face, but bobbed his head in understanding and held his hands in the air. "Noted. Anyways that's—" he knocked his knuckles against the wood of the desk "—that's that I guess." He pointed at the door. "You can go now."

But Charlie didn't move from her chair. Instead she settled into it, crossing her legs and staring evenly. "Not quite yet," she said, making him straighten in his seat. Charlie leaned forwards, resting her arms on the table, and shrugged her shoulders with an almost threateningly sweet quality. "I've got a few conditions of my own. Three to be exact."

Finstock eyed her with a high degree of suspicion. "I may or may not be vaguely terrified right now."

"That makes perfect sense."

"Yeah," Finstock said, rubbing at his jaw and never taking his eyes off her. "That's what I was afraid of."

"Condition one," she barreled on, not ignoring the uncomfortable expression that was now etched into _his_ face. "It's the same as yours. No overlap between home and school. If you come up and start talking to me about your dinner plans, I will not respond and will immediately start walking in the opposite direction. Condition two, do _not_ bother me about homework. If I haven't started writing my history paper yet, I know I still have to work on it. I don't need you to tell me."

After that she paused, letting it all sink in. Finstock nodded with that same sort of crazed enthusiasm he seemed to have for everything. "I can live with that. What's the third condition?"

And then Charlie smiled. A smile that made Finstock go even paler than usual. "The third one isn't so much a rule as a promise. Number three: if you hurt Mel in any way, I will kill you."

Finstock started to laugh, shaking an amused finger at her, but when he took note of her somber expression, his attitude immediately changed. He went rigid and there was a fearful glint in her eye. "Will you now?"

Charlie shrugged for what felt like the thousandth time. "My dad was in the Coast Guard. He had a gun. I'm not sure which box it's in, but it is definitely somewhere in the attic."

"You know how to shoot a gun?" Finstock demanded.

"No," Charlie replied. "I have no idea how to shoot a gun. At least not well. But then again I might not have ever had the proper motivation."

Finstock actually gulped audibly as he looked at her. "Alright, I'm just going to come out and say it. You scare me."

"Good."

Being a general fan of the dramatic exit, Charlie chose that moment to get out of that chair and march out of his office. But as soon as she left the room, that sense of satisfaction subsided slightly. Honestly she didn't know how she felt about the whole 'Mel dating her teacher' thing yet. She knew Mel deserved to be happy—Finstock probably deserved to be happy too—but until she knew how this was going to change things, she couldn't say for sure that she would be able to deal with the whole thing. Not that she would say anything. As far as her aunt was concerned, she was an Oswinstock shipper. And no she did not respect herself for coining the term. Though she doubted that she would be the last to use it.

Sighing heavily, Charlie collapsed back against the wall behind her and slid down till she was sitting on the gym floor. Jesus. As much as she hated spa days, she could really use some sort of deep tissue massage or something. Or a lobotomy. She wasn't quite sure which. All she was sure of was the fact that she needed a break—a full seventy-two hours where she could do nothing but sleep and catch up on old episodes of 'The Daily Show'. But, as per usual, Murphy's Law intervened. Something bad happened.

After Charlie's brain stopped screaming at her, she heard something else. A soft, determined whimpering. Her eyes flew open and she stared straight across the gym. Most of the lights were off—it was the end of the school day—but the ones right above the climbing wall were still blazing and they threw into relief the figure of a trembling girl with blonde, frizzy hair.

Charlie's heart seized in her chest and she pushed herself back up to her feet, stumbling as she did so. The girl was almost to the top of the wall, no harness and no spotter, hauling her way to the top like she had something to prove. It couldn't end well. And then Charlie saw the girl start to shake.

"Erica, no!"

The words ripped out of her like a tornado, like they were physically ejected from her body. She could run—she tried to run—but it didn't make any difference. She was too far away, too slow, to do anything. The whole thing happened like it was in slow motion. Erica shook violently, at first managing to hang on, but then fell backwards onto a mat that was nowhere near good enough to catch her fall.

But apparently Erica didn't need a mat. As she was running towards the girl, someone else managed to get there much, much quicker than her. Scott flew across the gym just and time. Erica was feet from colliding with the cold, hard ground, but Scott swooped in just in time to catch her, lowering her slowly and steadily to the ground. Now that she thought of it, that was the best way to describe Scott. Steady. Scott was steady.

Just as she skidded to a halt next to Scott, a number of other people did too. Stiles, Allison, and a few other onlookers—all of them crowded around Erica's spasming body. She was having a seizure. Charlie and Stiles exchanged a look for about half a second before returning to Erica. "Put her on her side!" Allison exclaimed. "Put her on her side!"

"Hurry!" Charlie hissed. "So she doesn't choke on her own vomit."

Scott did as he was told and shifted Erica, holding her hand as it and grasping it to keep her in place. Charlie held on to Erica's shoulder, trying to keep her steady. The force with which her body shook...Charlie almost couldn't hold her in place.

"How did you know?" Allison whispered to Scott.

Scott shook his head and looked up at Allison. "I didn't."

That sickened feeling twisted inside Charlie again—that feeling that things were about to go horribly, horribly wrong. Instinctively she looked between Stiles, Allison, and Scott, but none of their faces held any answers. But then she looked in the direction of the entry to the gym. Then she didn't need a 'look' or an 'impression' to understand. All she needed was to see was his silhouette in the doorway. That one shadow, and while she didn't know exactly what was going to happen, she knew it would mean trouble.

Because she was pretty damn sure that shadow was Derek.

**GAH! Sorry this took so long. Not a ton of Stiles in this chapter, but it's a chapter dedicated to Allison, Isaac, and Finstock. The next chapter will have a TON OF STILES, and that's all in caps for a reason. Seriously, it's gonna be adorable. I've got most of the scenes in my head, I've just gotta write them down.**

**PLEASE REVIEW! I've had a seriously shitty week. So, pretty please! Review! Make me feel happy and make the muse in my basement stop raiding the fridge. SHE ATE MY BEN & JERRY'S! That is unacceptable. Nobody touches my ice cream.**

**SOUNDTRACK!**

**Allison and Charlie go out to the woods and practice archery.**

**-~-~-~-~-~Hand Over Hand – Dana Buoy**

**Charlie and Isaac have an awkward yet meaningful conversation.**

**-~-~-~-~-~Constellating – James & Evander**

**Everybody gets ready to climb the wall, Charlie and Stiles debate.**

**-~-~-~-~-~Coma – Brother**

**Erica falls off the wall, Charlie sees Derek in the doorway.**

**-~-~-~-~-~New York Is Killing Me – Gil Scott-Heron*******The percussion in this song is amazing. I picked it because of the rhythm. It sounds like there's a resigned anxiety to it. Like Charlie sees Derek and knows he's going to do something with Erica, but also knows she can't change anything about it. **


	11. On Thin Ice

**Disclaimer: 'Teen Wolf' isn't mine. Shocking, right? But it's true. If there are any similarities in content or dialogue, it has probably originated with the show.**

**A huge thank you to chibichibi98, Shes-The-Proto-Type, Female whovian, WhatsGoingOn, Jordy rox ur sox, Plague's vengeance, Bookiee, meels234, SK-Scatenato, ssstilinski, emmy72, Guest 1, YelloSubmarine93. Gee Brittany, pennamethathasn'tbeentaken, Ayine, Valkyrie101, Atomicity, katiesgotagun, bagginsoftheshire666, lizzy g, ParalyzedInHeaven, Tania, TheMMG, Iwannabelikeme, Anon, Undeniable Weirdness, ellosaurus, etro13, PurpleRaining, Guest 2, Guest 3, and A silence reasder for reviewing~ Thank you all so much!**

**First off, I would like to thank 'Anon' for the lovely review. You have no idea how much that meant to me. Thank you so much. I hope two write my own bood some day. In fact, I've started a novel, but it's been a while since I worked on in. I will finish it though. One day. Hopefully. Just...thank you so much.**

Chapter 11 – On Thin Ice

To Charlie, there was something particularly annoying about Thursdays. Honestly she kind of hated them. It wasn't a particularly rational aversion—who the hell disliked a day of the week? It wasn't like there was anything scheduled each Thursday that she found especially unpleasant. No, she disliked Thursdays on principal. Thursdays were when she started looking forward to the weekend, but there was still that pesky little Friday standing between her and freedom. Like it was mocking her. Yup, the only thing worse that Thursdays were Wednesdays. And Tuesdays. And if she was being honest, Mondays weren't exactly a sack of adorable puppies either.

Charlie sighed to herself as she slowly pushed her way through the lunch line, ignoring the way she was being jostled by the overly eager students on either side of her. Under normal circumstances she would glower at them all and tell them to calm the hell down while they were waiting to be given mystery meat #4, but she didn't have the energy for etiquette lessons today.

It wasn't that Charlie wasn't getting any sleep. After she had gotten home yesterday, she had done her homework, studied up on History after that freaking B, and then collapsed in bed at about 9:00. She had fallen asleep within about five minutes, and stayed asleep until her phone started blaring at 7:00 a.m. the next morning. That was a full ten hours. But it wasn't how long she slept that mattered. It was where her mind went when she did sleep. Sometimes she felt like her brain used up so much energy with all these bullshit dreams, she might as well have never slept at all.

"Next!"

The harsh, disillusioned, slightly resentful voice of Janice the lunch lady shook out of her semi-comatose state. Charlie pushed that red tray with images of male genitalia doodled over it—courtesy of her incredibly mature classmates—a little bit further down the counter and smiled wanly at the woman. Janice just glared back at her, that hairnet and burly arms making her look oddly threatening. The woman stared back at Charlie with a deadened look in her eye, dropping the 'meal' on her plate and jerking her head to make Charlie move down the line.

When Charlie looked at her plate, she felt two things. One, that usual sensation of mild disgust. Two, a defeated sort of frustration. Fish sticks. She just spent the last night standing waist deep in the water in a river with Peter teaching her how to fly-fish for no apparent reason—constantly berating her on her impatience—and now she was staring at a plate of fish sticks. The universe had a strange sense of humor.

Once she had obtained her mediocre and appropriately unhealthy meal, Charlie turned away from the lunch line and scanned the room looking for one person in particular, and that person had blonde frizzy hair. But Charlie didn't see Erica anywhere. She wasn't sure why she expected to or hoped to see Erica somewhere in the crowd. The girl had had a seizure less than 24 hours previously. That tended to be something that merited a sick day. Maybe it was just her looking for a little bit of reassurance that nothing more significant did happen to Erica. After what happened the day before—seeing Derek, or at least thinking she saw him—Charlie had a funny feeling that took up residence in the base of her stomach. But then again that wasn't very strange anymore. Most of the things that happened to her these days gave her a funny feeling. No Erica. She wasn't sure if that was a good thing or a bad thing.

Charlie was just about to stop looking for Erica and meander back over to the table she usually shared with Lydia, but her eyes zeroed in on something else—something strange. And, as per usual, that something strange involved Stiles. He was darting through the lines of tables, but not in the direction of his and Scott's usual table. He looked left and right, like he was trying to make sure nobody was watching him, and slid into the seat opposite a heavyset guy who was busy eating a sandwich with as much stealth as he could muster. Which honestly wasn't very much. Then the guy held something up and Stiles grabbed for it, only to have the other guy yank it back. Charlie narrowed her eyes at the scene. Okay. Interest piqued.

Narrowing her eyes, Charlie tried to identify the guy. Boyd. That was his name. She recognized him from her history class, but had never really talked to him before. He always seemed to place himself in the back corner, out of the way of everybody. He never seemed shy or anything, he just seemed...resigned. Like he didn't have anything he wanted to say. And from the expression on his face, he wasn't exactly overjoyed with the conversation he was in the middle of.

Taking that bright red tray, Charlie wound her way through the tables filled with students, coming up right behind Stiles. Boyd noticed her approach and looked at her with an expression of confusion, but Stiles didn't pick up on it. He was too busy reaching in his pocket and slamming money on the table, sliding it across to the guy like he was participating in the most inept drug deal of all time. Boyd looked down at the money and back up as Stiles again. "I said fifty," he deadpanned.

"Really?" Stiles said with shrug. "I remember twenty. I have a really good verbal memory. I remember twenty. I remember the distinctive 'tw—' sound. Tw—enty."

During Stiles's rambling nonsensical speech, the guy rolled his eyes, looking none too pleased with the situation. "I said fifty," the guy growled back. "With a 'f—' sound. Hear the difference?" Stiles made a strangled noise of protest, and the guy leaned forwards a bit glaring at him. "If you don't I can demonstrate some other words with the 'f—' sound."

At that point, Charlie decided it was time for her to enter the conversation. She slammed her lunch tray down on the table next to Stiles, making him jump about two feet in the air, and collapsed into the seat next to him. She placed her elbows on the table and propped her chin up on her folded hands, smiling beatifically at the pair of them. "Hello, gentleman," she said, smiling coyly. "What seems to be the problem?"

When Stiles's eyes fell on her, they widened in an expression of panic, like he had been caught in the middle of something. He had a sort of deer in headlights look about him, as if something had just gone terribly, terribly wrong. "Wha—nothing!" he stammered out as soon as his words found him again. "Nothing's happening. There's no problem. I'm just, you know, hanging out. With my good friend Boyd here. Just chillin'. Me and Boyd are buds, right Boyd?"

Stiles's head whipped around and he stared at Boyd with a look that somehow managed to be simultaneously pleading and threatening. Boyd remained just as stony-faced as ever except for the almost imperceptible wrinkling of his nose. "We're not friends," he deadpanned.

Stiles laughed uncomfortably and leaned across the table, lightly punching Boyd in the shoulder, a sentiment which evidently was not appreciated. "You and your sense of humor. It gets me every time. He's just kidding. Boyd here...he's a kidder. We're great friends. Aren't we?"

The laughter cut off abruptly and Stiles scrunched up his face in intense concentration, glowering at Boyd with an expression that clearly read 'don't ruin this for me'. But Boyd didn't seem to care all that much. He raised his eyebrows "No," Boyd said, staring at him evenly. "We're not."

At that Stiles shifted uncomfortably in his seat and opened and closed his mouth a few times before speaking again. "Well that hurts my feelings a little," he mumbled under his breath, drumming his fingers against the table.

As the two of them spoke, Charlie's eyes darted back and forth between the two of them like she was watching a game of tennis. An increasingly complicated and baffling game of tennis. "Okay, what the hell is going on," she said, pointing back and forth between the two of them.

"Nothing!" Stiles said, throwing his hands in the air, trying and failing to look innocent.

"It's a business transaction," Boyd replied before turning back to Stiles with a deadly expression. "I said fifty. As in f—ifty."

"H—yeah," Stiles said, glancing at Charlie self-consciously and bobbing his head. "I—I think I'm recalling it now. I think I just got it confused with—" he reached into his pocket and pulled out another crumpled green bill "—with f...orty." He slammed the bill on top of the one already resting on the table and looked up at Boyd with a hopeful expression. Boyd just reached into his bag of chips and grabbed a Dorito, placing it in his mouth and taking a dramatic bite. Apparently that meant no, because Stiles's shoulders sagged and he looked over at Charlie slightly self-consciously. She just shrugged and popped a tater tot into her mouth. Stiles sighed and looked back at Boyd, a wince etched into his face. "Come on, man," he whined. "Have you seen the piece-of-crap Jeep that I drive?"

"Have you seen the piece of crap bus that I take?" Boyd shot back.

"The man's got a point," Charlie mumbled through a mouthful of potato.

Stiles turned around in his chair, leveling Charlie with a scandalized look. "Wha—why are you helping him?" he demanded. "Are you his frigging advocate now?"

Charlie narrowed her eyes and leaned in towards him a bit. "How can I advocate for him when I literally have no idea what's happening?"

Stiles let out a small scoff and rolled his eyes at her. "Ugh, you're like the love child of Brutus, Benedict Arnold, and Judas."

Charlie rolled her eyes in turn and shifted in her seat, addressing Boyd instead. "Okay," she said, waving a tater tot in Boyd's direction. "You seem to have a decent mind for business, so I'm going to give you a counter-offer." She placed a forkful of mac n' cheese in her mouth, giving Boyd a few moments to mull it over for dramatic effect. She swallowed the cheese-drenched pasta and shot him a wide smile. "How about we make it forty-five and I punch Stiles. It's got two 'f—' sounds and you'll get to hear him squeal like a little girl."

Stiles's head snapped around and he looked at her with an expression of confusion. "Wait, what?"

For the first time, the corners of Boyd's lips twitched up into something slightly resembling a smile. "Deal."

The whole thing happened just a little too quickly for Stiles to make sense of what exactly what was happening. Charlie wasn't proud that she took advantage of that fact. Oh, who was she kidding? She was definitely proud of it. Was she proud of the fact that she was proud of it? No. But then again she didn't actually care all that much. "Okay," she said, wiping the ketchup away from the corners of her mouth. "I'm going to go for about 60% power."

Stiles was still gaping in confusion when Charlie punched him in the shoulder, making him yelp loudly and grab at his arm. She folded her arms on the table and smiled placidly at Boyd while Stiles glowered at her. "Wh—why the hell did you do that? How many times do I have to tell you! That's too hard!"

"Totally worth it," Boyd said through a snort.

"It was not worth it," Stiles spluttered loudly. "It was totally not worth it! Stop putting a price on my pain. And FYI five dollars is not nearly a big enough price!"

"Stiles, stop whining and pay the man," Charlie said in a reasonable tone, gesturing in Boyd's direction.

"Yeah," Boyd piled on with a smirk. "Pay the man."

Stiles looked back and forth between Charlie and Boyd like he had uncovered one of the world's greatest conspiracies before huffing loudly and digging in his wallet for the extra five. "You want me to pay the man?" he muttered under his breath. "Fine I'll pay the man. I'll pay him right in the freaking face."

"That doesn't make any sense," Boyd said dully

"Don't tell me what does and doesn't make sense!" Stiles grumbled. "You got the money. Now give me the friggin' keys!"

"No reason to be so rude about it.," Charlie replied innocently. She turned to the other boy and smiled widely. "Boyd, it's been a pleasure doing business with you."

Boyd nodded back in acknowledgement, but he was quickly interrupted. "You didn't do any business with him!" Stiles interjected almost angrily. "I did business. I was the business-doer in this little scenario. Hell, I paid!"

Ignoring the indignation of the guy sitting opposite him, Boyd calmly reached into his pocket and drew out a small leather key chain, allowing the glinting bits of metal to dangle from his finger. Charlie reached for them, but Stiles's hand darted forwards with surprisingly adept reflexes and snatched them away, glowering at her slightly as he shoved them in his pocket. "Thank you!" he announced in a tone that honestly didn't sound all that grateful.

"And now that said slightly sketchy business has been concluded," Charlie barreled on, looking between the two of them, "will someone please tell me what exactly is going on? What was that key for? Buried treasure? The gateway to the fountain of youth? A murder room?" At that last suggestion both boys eyes snapped to her, looking more than slightly perturbed. "What?" she said, shrugging her shoulders defensively. "I don't know what you do with your free time. Come on, what's it for?"

Stiles snapped his mouth shut and glanced around evasively, so Charlie changed her point of focus, looking instead at Boyd. She rightly assumed that Stiles's unwillingness to share with the class made him more likely to do so. His lips twitched slightly, making Stiles pale. He wheeled around in his chair, staring at Boyd with imploring eyes. "Don't—"

"It's the key to the ice rink," Boyd said simply. "Congratulations. You get to sneak in after hours."

Frowning slightly to herself, Charlie shot Stiles a questioning glance. Stiles turned away from her and glared at the boy opposite him. "Dammit, Boyd! What ever happened to confidentiality?"

Boyd shrugged and shoved a couple more Doritos, biting into them with a loud crunch for dramatic effect. Letting out a loud groan of frustration, Stiles threw himself out of his chair, almost knocking it over, grabbed his backpack, and began to march away, leaving Charlie sitting there alone with a forkful of mac n' cheese poised at her mouth. Her eyes travelled back to Boyd who was watching her with an expression that somehow managed to be simultaneously amused and unamused. Smiling at him, she slowly lowered her fork back down to the tray. "Excuse me."

Grabbing her tray, Charlie jumped to her feet and darted after Stiles. "Dude," she said, elbowing him in the side as she caught up with him, "what do you need a key to the ice rink for?"

He stopped and turned to face her, that same look of mild exasperation on his face. "The same thing people usually need keys to the ice rink for. To go skating."

Charlie shifted a bit on her feet, feeling uncomfortable and even the tiniest bit hurt by all the withholding. "Okay..." she drawled out. "It's not like you have to tell me everything about everything. What you do in your free time is up to you, I'm not trying to pry or anyth—"

"Wha—no!" Stiles exclaimed, looking slightly stricken at the suggestion. "No, no, no—it's not like that! It's—" He let out a sigh of frustration and rubbed awkwardly at the back of his neck, sparing Charlie a few fleeting glances. "Look, it was supposed to be a surprise, okay?"

Charlie furrowed her eyebrows in confusion. "A surprise?"

"Yeah, Charlie, a surprise," he said, rolling his eyes in exasperation. "You know, those things where you arrange something in secret so that you can then suddenly reveal said arrangement to make someone very happy. And then that person has a look of shock on their face and the planner of said surprise shouts 'surprise!' at the top of their lungs. It was one of those." He waved his hands around in the air a bit. "Surprise!"

"I'm familiar with the concept, Stiles," Charlie replied, raising her eyebrows at him and feeling a smile tug at the corners of her lips."

"I just figured we all needed a break, you know," Stiles murmured, bobbing his head along with his words. "With all the supernatural crap we've had to put up with? We're sixteen! We should be having ridiculous, irresponsible fun!"

"And going ice skating is 'irresponsible fun'?" Charlie asked, a smirk tugging at her lips. "Wow, Stilinski, you baller. Calm down before you hurt yourself. It's all fun and games until you wake up in a dumpster in Vancouver with no memory of the previous night."

"Hahaha," Stiles drawled out. "You're hilarious. So what do you think? Are we doing this or not?"

Charlie paused for a moment and pursed her lips in thought. "And who is 'we'?" she asked, using air quotes.

Immediately Stiles started opening and closing his mouth, like he was trying to talk but the he couldn't quite form the words. "Uh, you know, the proverbial 'we'. The 'we' who has to deal with all...all this stuff. I mean there's Scott and Allison. And then me, obviously, and—" he gestured at her awkwardly "—and clearly you. And all of us together—" he clapped his hands together "—all of us makes a 'we'."

"Okay."

Stiles's eyebrows pulled together and he stared at her suspiciously. "Okay?"

"Yeah," Charlie nodded. "Okay."

A wide grin split across Stiles's face. "Okay!"

A tiny bubble of happiness expanded in Charlie's chest. They were going to have fun. They were actually going to go off and have a perfectly normal day. She couldn't remember the last time she had had a normal day. Her life had been so decidedly atypical for so freaking long, she wasn't sure she would recognize one if it walked up to her, said hello, and smacked her across the face. It would be good—really good. But then she had to go and look to the left and she realized that their plans had a giant gaping hole in them.

Charlie's eyes happened to glance by the entrance in the cafeteria, only to see Lydia walking through it. The second she did, she knew something was wrong. Usually when Lydia entered any room, metaphorical trumpets would announce her entrance. She would walk with a long, confident steps, even with those heels, and the crowds of kids would do this weird thing where they parted to let her through like she was a force of nature or something. But today there was no big entrance. Lydia almost snuck in, her arms folded across her chest and taking tiny steps, like she was trying to make herself smaller. The sight of it made Charlie's heart seize up.

"What about Lydia?" she asked suddenly, turning to Stiles with an expression of concern.

At the suggestion, something in Stiles's face changed. It was like he had immediately become more uncertain—more nervous. But then again he usually did get more nervous about life in general whenever Lydia entered into the conversation. He let out an uncomfortable laugh and scratched at the back of his neck. "L—Lydia?" he murmured uncomfortably.

The hesitation Charlie felt was not something she was proud of. Or used to. Honestly she wasn't sure whether or not she really wanted Lydia to be there. On one hand Scott and Allison would pair off leaving Charlie and Stiles on her own, and Charlie would not object to more alone time with Stiles. On the other, Lydia would serve as a buffer. She was the perfect person to have around to keep her from thinking stupid, pointless, emotional, stupid—wait, she had already said that—thoughts about Stiles. And then something occurred to Charlie, making it feel like she had run face-first into a giant wall of guilt. She was being horrifically, almost disgustingly, selfish. She needed to be thinking about her best friend—the girl who, right now, was looking more than a little bit lost.

"Yeah," Charlie nodded, finally coming to a conclusion. "Don't you think she should come? I mean, she's been through so much lately...She needs a day off. Probably more than any of us if you think about it."

Stiles opened and closed his mouth a few times, not sure of how to respond. He shoved his hands in his pockets and shrugged a bit before responding. "Y—you think she'd have a good time?" he asked, his voice getting weirdly high-pitched. "I mean, ice skating? Does even she like that kind of thing, I don't—"

"Are you kidding?" Charlie asked through a snort. "A sport involves sparkly outfits, dramatic makeup, and being the center of attention? She loves that sort of stuff—there are pictures of her around the house of her ice skating when she's like six years old. Trust me. She'll be fine." Charlie let out a sigh and looked in Lydia's direction. "And she deserves to feel fine. I don't think she's felt fine for a while." She glanced at Lydia and then back at Stiles. "I think it would be good for her. Do you think it would be good for her?"

Stiles winced slightly, staring off into the distance. "I—I can't think of a single reason why it wouldn't."

"Okay," Charlie said with a definitive nod.

"Okay," Stiles said in an oddly pained tone. "Okay, that sounds good. So Lydia's...Lydia's gonna be there. That's great. Fantastic. You hungry?"

He immediately ducked away, heading to another table and, once again, leaving her standing there. Charlie made a face at nobody in general, confused by the weird behavior that seemed to be surrounding her today, and followed him. Again feeling more than slightly awkward, she followed Stiles and slid into seat opposite Scott. "Hey, Charlie!" Scott said, nodding at her with slightly more enthusiasm than usual. Definitely more enthusiasm than was necessary. "How are you?"

"Hey, Scott," Charlie said, shooting him a weird glance. "I'm pretty much the same as I was in chemistry seven minutes ago. How are you?"

"Great!" Scott said, nodding at her over his tray of food. "Fantastic. So, uh, so what are you doing tonight?"

Charlie shot him a weird look. "Well is seems like I'll be going ice skating," she replied narrowing her eyes at him.

The look on Scott's face was a special kind of shock. He turned to Stiles for some sort of explanation. "How did she—"

"Aren't we both tired of asking that question by now?" Stiles sighed out, rolling his eyes slightly. "It's usually the same answer. 'Because'."

"I prefer, 'Charlie's apparent clairvoyance is due to her incredible insight into all matters of the human condition,'" Charlie shot back, smirking over her third forkful of mac n' cheese. "That and the fact that people keep blurting things out to me. I guess I just have one of those trustworthy faces."

"Yeah...I don't think that's it," Stiles shot back. Charlie glowered at him in response, but he just shrugged defensively.

"So you're saying I'm clairvoyant, then," Charlie replied brightly. Stiles groaned theatrically.

"So you're in for tonight?" Scott asked, again with a weird degree of enthusiasm and looking back and forth between Stiles and Charlie with a frequency that was, quite frankly, unnecessary. Charlie opened her mouth to respond, but before she got the chance, Stiles answered for her.

"She's coming," he replied in an oddly tight voice. "So is Lydia. We're all going to have a great time."

All of the sudden Scott froze, an impossible large amount of food stuffed into his mouth. He looked from Stiles to Charlie and back to Stiles again, like he was confused. "Lydia's coming?" Scott mumbled, swallowing down the food. "I th—" Then there was a sudden thumping sound under the table. Scott let out a small grunt of pain, trying and failing to hide it behind a cough. "I think that's great," he finished. "I mean, of course Lydia's coming! Why wouldn't she be?"

Charlie narrowed her eyes and looked at the pair of them suspiciously. "Why are you being weird?"

"We're not being weird," Scott answered quickly. "No weirder than we usually are."

Then the three of them stayed quiet for a while, just staring at each other. The two of them were definitely hiding something. Usually she would have annoyed the shit out of them until they fessed up, but she was just too tired for any of that kind of stuff right now. Seeing that she wasn't going to pursue the issue further, Stiles let out a tiny sigh of relief and turned to Scott. "Alright," he muttered. "I'll pick up Scott after work and then we'll all meet at the rink at like 7:30. Cool?"

But Scott didn't respond. His attention span had never been the greatest, but this was a little extreme, even for him. Charlie lifted her hand and waved it in front of his face, snapping her fingers a few times. "Earth to Scott!" she said in a singsong voice. But, again, Scott didn't respond. And this time it wasn't because of his limited attention span. No, his attention was very focused on something behind her. He was staring over her shoulder in the direction of the cafeteria entrance. Her curiosity getting the better of her, Charlie twisted around in her chair to find out exactly what was so bloody interesting. When she did, her jaw dropped.

Erica Reyes. Charlie didn't pretend to know the girl at all—not outside the two or three times they had gotten paired together for chemistry lab—but she had always seemed small and scared. Scared of her classmates, scared of that climbing wall, scared of herself, kind of like a mouse. The girl she saw now was not scared. It would seem kind of cliché to call her 'fierce', but that was what she was. She was fierce. Gone were the baggy sweatshirts, frizzy hair, and orthopedic shoes. They were replaced skin-tight, barely-there clothes, glossy curls, and a pair of leopard print stilettos that Charlie would have broken an ankle in. One thing was for sure. The mouse was gone. She was a wolf now.

And then there was that other pressing question. Didn't high schools usually have a dress code?

The general sound of the cafeteria—the idle chatter and clacking of plastic forks hitting plastic plates—died down as Erica stomped into the cafeteria like it was a freaking runway. Because that's what this was, really. She was showing off the new her. The her after meeting Derek. Normally Charlie would have felt some small degree of satisfaction in knowing that she had been right—that it was Derek she saw skulking in the shadows—but this time being right didn't have the taste of victory it usually did. Derek had gotten a second one now. Which begged the question, how many was he going to take? When was he going to stop? Was he going to stop at all?

There was a strange sort of magnetism that surrounded Erica. If Charlie had been in the mood for puns, she would have called it animal magnetism, but they were kind of past puns at this point. Knowing full well that everybody's eyes were on her, Erica strolled to one of the tables and came to an abrupt stop. Leaning down and exposing as much cleavage as possible, Erica snatched the apple from a guy's tray, baring her teeth as she took a large, theatrical bite. Smirking and generally oozing with confidence, she wiped at her blood red lips.

A loud thump a few inches away from her broke the weird trance Erica had seemed to cause. Charlie looked up to see Lydia standing next to her, hands planted firmly on the table. As with pretty much everybody else, her eyes were on Erica, but they didn't hold that same stunned look everybody else's did. They held disdain. "What. The holy hell. Was that?"

"It's Erica," she heard a worried Scott murmur.

Charlie turned back to the blond long enough to see her marching right back out of the cafeteria, taking another dramatic bit of that freaking apple. "Is it just me or does she seem blonder than yesterday?" Charlie mused absently.

It was pretty clear that Scott and Stiles didn't hear her. Never taking their eyes off of Erica's retreating form, the pair clambered up from their seats and wordlessly sprinted after her. Charlie began to stand up as well, but before she could Lydia slid into Scott's newly vacated seat right across from her. "I mean, how the hell does that sort of thing happen?" Lydia said, reaching across the table and plucking one of the baby carrots off of Charlie's tray. "There's only one way a transformation like that can happen in a day."

"Emotional epiphany?" Charlie proposed.

Lydia rolled her eyes and shot Charlie a pitying look. "Elective surgery."

"Uh, Lydia—"

"Oh, come on, Charlie!" Lydia protested, waving her hand in the direction of the door. "Don't be so naïve! Something like that doesn't just happen with a snap of the fingers. She had something done."

Charlie let out a sigh and looked at the doorway. "Yeah," she murmured to herself. "She definitely did something."

"Thank you!" Lydia exclaimed, thinking Charlie was agreeing with her. "And if we're all being honest here, I think she kinda took it over the top. And by that I mean her boobs were over the top of her shirt. I mean I don't have anything against drawing attention to the pair—they are a good weapon to have in the arsenal—but what the hell ever happened to subtlety? Every strategist knows that you hint at what you have, you don't come out and say it. If you show all your cards, you have nothing else to play."

"You're saying she needs to play the cards close to her chest?" Charlie said with a snort.

"Yes," Lydia agreed, a smirk tugging at the corners of her lips. "Or at least use them to cover her chest."

Charlie let out an indelicate snort and finally took her eyes off the doorway, turning to look Lydia full in the face. It didn't take long for her to see it. It was almost imperceptible, but it was still there. That tiny smudge of black under her eyes. Lydia had tried to clean it up and make it go away, but she had missed a bit.

"Why are you looking at me like that?" Lydia demanded, making Charlie jump slightly.

Charlie opened and closed her mouth a few times, thrown by what was going on. "Lydia, have you been crying?"

That indelicately blunt question was met with an equally flustered response. Lydia's eyes widened with something resembling fear for about half a second, but then she shook her head casually. "I don't know what...you're talking about," she drawled out in that impossibly prim tone of hers. But then there was that tiny moment—the one where she instinctively reached up to wipe at her eye makeup again. That was the giveaway. As much as she tried to hide it, something had happened.

Charlie scoffed loudly and stared across the table at Lydia with raised eyebrows. "Really?" she demanded. "You're going to try and pull with that evasive crap with me? Me? I can tell when you're lying, Lydia. What happened?"

Lydia pursed her lips and sat back in her chair, sighing in exhaustion. Emotional exhaustion. "Jackson," Lydia mumbled almost incoherently.

Suddenly Charlie's spine straightened, sitting upright in her seat. "Jackson?" she asked, her voice suddenly getting low and harsh. "What the hell did he do?"

Lydia let out a low groan. "Charlie, don't—"

"Oh, Charlie will!" she objected loudly. "Charlie most definitely will! What did he do?"

"N—nothing," Lydia protested, shaking her head.

And then Charlie pulled out the big guns. Ever since she was like ten she had had this look—one that made people blurt out everything. It was trusting, suspicious, and slightly judgmental all at once. "What did he do, Lydia?"

"I—I really don't know," Lydia stammered, waving her hand dismissively. "He just rambled about how nothing happened to me and how I ruined everything and blah, blah, blah. You know men. Always so insecure." She paused for a moment, looking at Charlie. "Why are you making your 'crazed badger' face at me?"

"Just thinking about how I'm going to retaliate," she sighed almost happily. "If I punch him in the trachea he can't speak. If I punch him in the nose it messes up his face. If I punch him in the nads, he can't procreate. I can't decide which of those options I find more appealing. It's a big decision to make on exceedingly short notice."

"How about you just let it go?" Lydia whined.

Charlie chuckled to herself and shook her head. "I'm not sure you've noticed this about me, Lydia, but I'm not so good at letting it go. Especially when it comes to people screwing with my friends."

"Charlie, let it go," Lydia repeated, this time looking at Charlie with a pleading expression. "Please. I just—I don't want to think about it, okay? Can we just move on?"

There was a mild note of hysteria in Lydia's voice that made Charlie's chest tighten. As much as Lydia put on a brave face, there was something simmering right below the surface, threatening to boil over at any moment. Charlie didn't want that to happen, and that meant she couldn't push to hard. "Okay," she acquiesced, holding her hands in the air and physically backing off. "Okay, fine."

Lydia let out a tiny sigh and flipped her hair over her shoulder, reassuming her typical attitude. "Great," she trilled. "Now are we going to do something tonight, or are you going to be hiding in your room studying like the agoraphobes they make TLC shows about?"

Charlie snorted lightly at her friend and waggled her eyebrows theatrically. "Get happy, Lydia. We have plans."

Letting out a scoff, Lydia rolled her eyes. "About freaking time."

The rest of the school day passed relatively uneventfully. Erica's seemingly miraculous makeover sent a wave throughout the school so that it was hashed and re-hashed an infinite number of times over the course of the day. Words like 'boob job' had been thrown into rotation by some of her more bitter classmates, while the term 'I'd hit that' was utilized quite frequently by the more lecherous ones. It was probably exactly what Erica had wanted out of the whole thing—to be visible. But with all the stories flying around about her and how she had become...that...there was only really one that caught Charlie's attention. The one about her ditching class and getting into a black Camaro with a hot older guy.

But, for once, they didn't rush off and immediately begin scheming of ways to save the day. No, today was going to be calm, relaxed, and, above all else, normal. Or at least it was supposed to be in theory. It was kind of difficult to chill at your friend's house when you knew that friend's dad was a werewolf hunter with a basement full of guns. And that he hated you. And that the sweet old grandpa who greeted her with a smile at the door cut people in half with broadswords.

After school the three girls went to Allison's to kill time before going to the ice rink. And despite the inherent discomfort she felt every time she walked into Allison's house, she actually had a nice time. They chatted, they laughed, selfies were involved—it did almost seem normal. The sun slowly sank in the sky and eventually it was time to make their exit. After giving Mr. Argent numerous assurances that they were just going to study at Lydia's, they climbed into Charlie's Impala and took off for the ice rink.

"Ugh, remind me why we took this car instead of my Beetle?" Lydia whined from the back seat as the car flew down the road. "This thing smells like curly fries."

"Pshah," Charlie mumbled to herself. "You say that like it's a bad thing."

Lydia leaned forwards in her seat, perching her chin on Allison's headrest and looking back and forth between the two other girls. "So what exactly are we doing here?" she asked, her eyebrows pulling together quizzically.

Charlie glanced up at the girl's reflection in the rearview mirror and shrugged. "We're going to an ice rink, Lydia. Conventionally when one is at an ice rink, one ice skates. I thought you were supposed to be the smart one."

"Oh, you know what I mean," Lydia said with a roll of her eyes. "Ice skating...it's a couple thing. You get to be all flirty and wear short skirts. I've been told Scott's joining us."

Lydia turned and looked at Allison pointedly, making Allison shift uncomfortably in her seat. "Yeah, Scott's going to be there," Allison mumbled, tucking her hair behind her ears. "Why does that matter?"

"Because this is clearly a date-type scenario!" Lydia proclaimed waving her hands around a bit. "Which begs the question, why are Charlie and I here? Not that I'm complaining, but aren't we kind of going to be third and fourth wheels?"

"Wha—no!" Allison protested. "No, you're not. We just thought with all the crazy things going on, we should have a day that was just us. Friends. God knows we all need a day off."

Lydia pursed her lips and let out a small harrumph. "I still think it seems like a date thing." And then Lydia turned to Charlie, making her cringe in anticipation. "Hey," Lydia said, smacking Charlie in the shoulder. "How about you get on the phone and invite your aunt and Coach Finstock? Then they could double!"

"I will literally kill you," Charlie mumbled darkly, keeping her eyes fixed on the road.

"It just kind of feels like we're crashing," Lydia barreled on, ignoring Charlie's threats.

Allison let out a small snort. "Since when was that an issue for you?" she asked with a smirk. "I seem to recall a time when you were perfectly happy crashing my date with Scott. I believe bowling was involved."

"That was not crashing," Lydia snapped back. "That was expanding upon already existing plans to make them more awesome."

Sighing to herself, Allison shook her head. "If you say so."

"Look, this is not a date," Charlie announced, slamming one hand against the steering wheel definitively. "This is the definition of a 'group hang'. Stiles is going to be there too. So can we just relax and have fun and stop over-analyzing the situation? Thank you!"

"Okay!" Lydia said, throwing her hands in the air and settling back in her seat. "Fine. Untwist your Fruit of the Loom underoos. Let's go have fun."

After that, Charlie hit the volume control, turning it up a few notches as the car flew down the highway. She wasn't sure why, but she was nervous. The ice rink made her nervous. Being around Stiles and Lydia at the same time made her nervous. Until now she had pretty much been able to keep the two of them—those two parts of her life—completely separate. There was Stiles and then there was Lydia and then you threw in the fact that Stiles was in love with Lydia. All aspects could be at least partially compartmentalized. Now they were colliding. And it had been her idea in the first damn place.

Good job, Charlie. You're a freaking genius.

Nope. No. She had to lock it all down. She had to deal with this. She had to see it and experience it and move on. Because that was the only way any of this was going to end up okay. All other roads led to her crying in the shower, and that was not a stereotype she was comfortable with.

By the time that Charlie had finally pulled into the parking lot to the ice rink, the parking lot was empty except for that one blue Jeep. The three girls climbed out of the car and walked towards the rink, and Charlie found herself getting even more nervous than before. It was stupid—there was no reason for it—but her body didn't seem to be listening to her head. It rarely ever did. But she did end up listening to something else—Scott and Stiles arguing.

"...so this had _got_ to be good, okay?" Stiles's voice hissed urgently. "Seriously. Just—just make sure nothing goes horribly and irrevocably wrong."

"Dude," Scott said in a reasonable tone. "Be cool."

"I am cool!" Stiles exclaimed in a tone that was most certainly not cool. "I am the epitome of cool. I'm cool as a friggin' cucumber—I have reached cucumber-like status. That's how cool I am!"

"Really?" Scott asked. "Because you don't seem cool. You're left eye is kinda twitching a bit."

Stiles let out a scoff and shook his head. "I wanna punch you in the face so bad right now."

At that point Allison delicately cleared her throat, alerting both of the guys to her presence. Stiles and Scott, who were huddled together at the front entrance to the rink, looked up suddenly with slightly baffled expressions. Immediately they stepped away from each other, large smiles covering their faces, and looked at the trio.

"Greetings...ladies..." Stiles drawled out, grinning and offering up a long wave. "W—welcome!"

"Isn't this place closed on Thursdays?" Lydia asked eyeing him carefully.

Stiles opened and closed his mouth a few times, searching for something to say. "Uh, well, usually," he mumbled, scratching at the back of his neck. "But we managed to procure some rarefied—"

"We bribed Boyd for the keys," Charlie interrupted with a smirk. "In a totally badass way. And now we're going to have a wonderful time. Isn't that right?"

"H—yeah!" Stiles responded with an awkward nod. "Of course we are." He shoved his hand in his pocket and pulled out her keys, waving them around a little before unlocking the door and wrenching it open. He held it open, gesturing at them to step through. Charlie felt a little bit of hesitation, but when it was her turn she walked through it with an easy smile.

At first the rink was dark, and quite frankly seemed a bit ominous. But then, all of the sudden, there was that clanking noise and a series of lights switched on, leaving Charlie staring at a room of such dazzling white, it almost hurt to look at it. It took her eyes a few moments to adjust to the light, but when they did she was met with a completely empty rink. She turned around to see Stiles standing next to the light switch, looking supremely pleased with himself.

"Come on," Allison said, grabbing Scott's hand and pulling him after her. "Let's get some skates."

After raiding the skate rental facility tucked in the corner, the lot of them went to the bleachers to lace them up. It turned out Lydia was right. Almost instantaneously, Allison and Scott peeled away from the rest of the group, talking together in hushed voices and smiling much more than any two people should. The pair of them were painfully adorable. But unfortunately this time their adorableness put Charlie in a very uncomfortable position. A position which involved her sitting between Lydia and Stiles, trying to keep her cool. Charlie paid a special degree of attention to the lacing of her skates, trying to ignore the inherent discomfort the whole situation and kicking herself for creating the situation in the first place.

"Ugh, could it be any colder in here?" Lydia whined, rubbing at her shoulders to warm herself up.

"It's an ice rink, Lydia," Charlie murmured, pulling the laces as tight as she could. "I don't know if you've heard, but ice is typically cold."

Lydia let out a small scoff and rolled her eyes. "Thank you for those remarkable insights, Charlie. What would I do without you?"

"Bring a sweater?" Charlie suggested, smirking at her.

"Uh, hold on a second," Stiles mumbled. He grabbed his backpack off the ground and rooted around in it for a bit before yanking out a bright orange hoodie. He reached across Charlie, holding it out for Lydia to take. "Here."

In that moment, Charlie was pretty she was about to have the most fundamentally awkward evening of her entire existence. Why had she thought this was a good idea again?

Lydia glanced between Stiles and the hoodie, wrinkling her nose slightly. "I'm wearing blue," she replied simply, like that explained something. Both Charlie and Stiles looked at her with baffled expressions, making Lydia roll her eyes. "Seriously, Charlie? I don't know why I bother with you. Orange and blue? Not a good combination."

"But it's the colors of the Mets!" Stiles protested, sounding more than a little bit offended.

Charlie let out a snort and shook her head at him. "And that's significant how exactly? Aren't you the self-described 'long-suffering Mets fan'? The colors don't seem to be working in their favor all that much."

At that, Stiles's mouth dropped open and he stared at her in shock. "You take that back right now!"

"And why are you such a fan of a New York-based team?" Charlie barreled on, eyeing him curiously. "It may have escaped your notice, but we're in California. You'd have to try really freaking hard to find a place in the continental U.S. that's further from New York. If you're looking that far for a team, you should at least pick one that wins."

The scandalized expression on Stiles's face shifted slightly, and he looked at her with genuine offense. "Wh—why would you say something like that?" he said, gaping at her. "Are you trying to hurt me? Actively?"

"All I'm saying is that blue and grey go together just fine," she said with a prim shrug.

Stiles let out a small, strangled cry and looked at her like she had just told him she was a serial killer. "No!" he hissed under his breath, shaking his head at her. "Grey and bl—You're a Yankees fan?! That—that is just totally unacceptable! I think my soul just died a little bit."

"Oh my God."

At the sudden sound of her voice, both Stiles and Charlie looked up in Lydia's direction. Charlie had been expecting to see a look at frustration, narrowed eyes and wrinkled nose, scolding the two of them for rambling about something that was as 'boring' as baseball, but apparently that wasn't the case. No, Lydia was looking back and forth between Stiles and Charlie with wide eyes and her mouth hanging open slightly. It was a look of realization. She knew. Immediately Charlie felt her stomach drop and a feeling of terror flooded through her. Oh, shit. Shit, shit, shit. This was not going to be good.

"Lydia, are you okay?" Stiles asked, eyeing her with mild concern

Lydia shook her head to re-organize her thoughts, and then let a slightly calculating smile pull at the corner of her lips. "Fine," she chirped, tossing some hair over her shoulder. "Fantastic, actually. I've just got to talk to Charlie about something."

"No you don't," Charlie replied with a tight smile of her own. "You really don't. We're all good."

Lydia got to her feet, balancing on the blades of the skates, and planted her hands on her hips. "I'm sorry," Lydia shot back. "Did I insinuate that you had a choice in the matter?"

With that Lydia grabbed hold of Charlie's hand and yanked her off of the bench, dragging her off and leaving a baffled Stiles in their wake. Charlie stumbled after Lydia, almost toppling over multiple times as her skates wobbled beneath her. When they finally got a suitable distance away from Stiles, the red-head came to an abrupt stop, making Charlie almost ram into her. Finally releasing Charlie's hand, Lydia spun on her heel and folded her arms across her chest, facing the other girl down.

"Well that seemed a little unnecessary," Charlie mumbled, rubbing at her now probably bruised hand.

Lydia ignored her, raising her eyebrows expectantly. "What the hell was that?"

"What the hell was what?" Charlie mumbled evasively.

"Oh, please," Lydia scoffed. "That!" She jerked her head in Stiles's direction. "That little quippy adorable back-and-forth thing! What was that?!"

"You mean the thing where I said something and then Stiles said something?" Charlie replied. "It's called a conversation. People have them all the time. We're having one right now."

Lydia's mouth snapped shut and her eyes narrowed into slits. She leaned forwards slightly and studied Charlie carefully, like she was trying to climb inside her friend's head and read her mind. The whole thing made Charlie want to run away screaming, but Lydia had chosen her moment well. With those skates strapped to her feet, Charlie wasn't running anywhere. All she could do was fidget uncomfortably. When the girl finally spoke, the tone was almost accusatory. "You like him, don't you?"

Shit. She had asked the question. And before Charlie could even open her mouth to respond, her face had given the answer. "Oh my God!" Lydia squealed with no small degree of excitement. "You do! You so do!"

Charlie hissed at Lydia, waving her hands to get her to quiet down. "You want to be a little louder?" she shushed. "I'm pretty sure they didn't hear you on the International Space Station."

"Oh, this is such a relief," Lydia sighed happily ignoring Charlie's annoyed glares. "I was beginning to think your lady-parts were frozen or something."

"Excuse me?" Charlie said, glowering at her. But Lydia wasn't paying attention. Her eyes were focused on the boy sitting on the bleachers, struggling to lace up his skates. She was staring at Stiles with a special sort of intensity, like she was measuring him up. "Hm," she murmured, nibbling on her lip in consideration. "I guess he's kind of cute if you look at him in the right light. Normally I'd say you could do better, but given the fact that the closest you've gotten to any sort of action was that time you kneed Aaron Harrison in the balls, I think you should go for it."

"I kneed Aaron Harrison in the balls?" Charlie mumbled. "I forgot about that time—I've been kneeing a lot of people in the balls."

"Is this really what you want to be talking about right now?" Lydia said, eyeing her with derision. "What the hell are you waiting for? Go get him."

Charlie squeezed her eyes shut for a moment and shook her head. This was why she hadn't wanted Lydia to know about it in the first place. Because Lydia pushed. Once she got her mind set on something, she latched onto it and didn't let it go. That meant she was gong to make Charlie talk about it. A lot. And that was the last thing Charlie wanted to do. It was easier when she could shove her feelings away and pretend that they didn't exist. Talking about it hurt.

"I can't," she murmured quietly.

"You're being ridiculous," Lydia scoffed. "Don't expect me to repeat this in front of other people, but you're a catch. He'll be thrilled. Just go and—"

"What did Stiles say to you at the formal?" Charlie interrupted, leveling Lydia with a serious look. "Any mention of feelings or anything?"

Immediately something in Lydia's face changed. She snapped her mouth shut and looked away from Charlie, an almost guilty expression on her face. That look was more than enough to confirm Charlie's suspicions. She had already known what the answer to her question was, but seeing it was different. There was a strange sort of ache building up in her chest, and it felt like it might never go away. "Exactly," Charlie nodded. "I'm not the one he wants."

"But I don't want him!" Lydia protested, throwing her hands in the air.

"Well thanks so much for the donation from the Lydia Martin reject pile, but he's not going to just stop having feelings for you because you don't want him! People don't work like that!"

Lydia blinked in shock at Charlie's sudden outburst and took a tiny step back, leaving Charlie with yet another emotion to throw onto the impossibly huge pile. Guilt. Swearing under her breath, she rubbed at her forehead to stave off the headache that was beginning to form. "I'm sorry," she whispered. "I'm sorry, that wasn't fair."

"Whoa," Lydia murmured, looking at Charlie with sympathy. "You _really_ like him."

Charlie sighed and nodded her head reluctantly. "Kind of, yeah."

"Then do something about it!" Lydia urged, placing a comforting hand on Charlie's shoulder. "I mean he clearly already enjoys your company. You just have to get him to see you in a different context. Smile more, dress up a little—"

"No," Charlie said, shaking her head. "If I have to change myself to get a boy to like me, then the relationship wouldn't be what I wanted it to be, would it? Stiles has been in love with you since he was eight. He has told me so on multiple occasions. He and I are just friends. The sooner I come to terms with that, the better."

"Wha—seriously?" Lydia protested. "You are so impossible. Come here." Without any additional warning, Lydia reached forwards, grabbed Charlie's face, and pulled her forwards a bit.

"Lydia, wh—what the hell are you doing?" Charlie stammered.

Lydia didn't respond. She ignored all of Charlie's noises of protest and reached into her pocket, pulling out a small black tube of lipstick, never releasing her hold on Charlie's chin. Popping off the cap, she raised the thing to Charlie's face, applying it liberally to her friend's lips. Finally she released Charlie's face and took a set back, letting out a satisfied sigh. "There!" she quipped smirking widely. "Was that so hard?"

"Kind of, yeah!" Charlie said, rubbing at her jaw. "Can we just go skate now?"

Lydia sighed and looked around the rink. Once again her eyes settled on Stiles, and a tiny, knowing smirk tugged at the corners of her lips. That look scared Charlie, because that was the look she got when she was coming up with a plan. "Sure, Charlie," she said, patting her friend's hair. "Let's go skate."

With that, Lydia marched past Charlie with a speed that should be impossible with those skates on and joined Allison and Scott who were both already on the ice. Charlie groaned internally and let her head sag on her shoulders. It didn't take much to see what the girl was doing. As devious as Lydia was, she could be really freaking transparent sometimes. She was removing herself from the situation so Charlie and Stiles would pair off. The girl was an evil genius.

Slowly, Charlie wobbled in the direction of the ice, doing her best not to face plant. As she did, the boy in question walked towards her, hands shoved in his pockets and a confused expression. "Hey, is everything okay?" Stiles asked quietly as he approached her. "What was all that about?"

"Nothing," Charlie said, waving her hand dismissively. "Just Lydia being Lydia. There's no explaining like 80% of the things she does."

Stiles bobbed his head in understanding and glanced across the ice where Lydia was skating gracefully. Then she went into one of those spin moves, her skirt flaring out and her hair whipping around like a fiery cyclone. "Whoa," Stiles said, gaping at her slightly. "You weren't lying when you said she was into this. That was—"

"Yup," Charlie sighed resignedly, popping the 'p'. "She's pretty great."

Then Stiles turned back to her, rubbing at the back of his neck and clearing his throat awkwardly. "So, uh, so what about you?" he asked, smacking her lightly in the shoulder. "You ready to show us some of those patented Charlie Oswin moves?"

Charlie winced slightly at the suggestion and shrugged. "Don't have any," she admitted. "This...this is actually the first time I've been ice skating."

Stiles's mouth dropped open and he looked at her in shock. "Wha—seriously? How can you have never been ice skating before? That's—that's ridiculous!"

"Well Scott's never been before either," Charlie shot back, nodding in Scott and Allison's direction.

"Yeah, but Scott's a guy."

"That's sexist."

Stiles let out a groan and rolled his eyes heavily. But then something in his face changed. The ghost of a smile pulled at the corners of his lips. He glanced back and forth between Charlie and the ice a few times. "Well I guess I'm just going to have to teach you, then," he sighed out.

Charlie's eyebrows pulled together in a frown. "Teach me?" she asked, a skeptical look in her eye.

"Yup," Stiles said with a smile. "I am going to teach you how to skate."

"It's pretty straightforward, Stiles," Charlie shot back. "I think I can handle it."

"Come on, Charlie," he said, raising his eyebrows at her. "We've all seen you dance. And now you're gonna have two giant knives strapped to your shoes."

"Is this supposed to make me more likely to let you teach me?" she shot back.

Stiles made a face and threw his hands in the air. "All I'm saying is it's in the interest of public safety for you to let me give a few pointers. Otherwise you could end up like that." He jerked his thumb over his shoulder in Scott's direction. With perfectly comic timing, Scott tripped on nothing and went sailing through the air, collapsing onto the ice in a crumpled heap. Charlie winced sympathetically and Stiles nodded at her. "Yup," Stiles said, looking oddly pleased with his best friend's pain. "That could be you."

Charlie watched as Allison slowly pulled Scott up to his feet, only to have his feet slip out from under him, sending him crashing to the ground yet again. "Okay," Charlie agreed. "Fine. A couple of pointers."

A goofy grin spread across his face, and he waved his hands in the 'after you' gesture, following her to the door that led onto the ice. Stiles went out first, reaching out a hand to her as she approached the ice. "You, uh, you should probably hold onto me for a little bit," he said, nodding at her. "For balance, you know. While you're still finding your feet."

There was a strange look of anticipation on his face. He kept glancing back and forth between her and that extended hand. Honestly, that extended hand made Charlie nervous. What if her palms started sweating? She never had to worry about sweaty palms before. Son of a bitch—what was she turning into?

After taking an almost imperceptible steadying breath, Charlie reached out and took Stiles's hand allowing herself to be pulled out onto the ice. "If I fall and break something, I will sue you for negligence," she said, looking at him pointedly.

"That'll never hold up in court," he shot back.

"I feel like a toddler right now," Charlie grumbled as he dragged her out on the ice. "If I skin my knee are you going to give me a lollypop and pat me on the head?"

"Shut up and absorb the knowledge."

Stiles's hand was warm and comfortable in hers. She kept thinking that it kind of felt like it belonged there, but she kept that to herself. Stiles led her around the rink a few times, letting her get the hang of the whole skating thing and keeping her upright the coupled of times that she stumbled. But not without making a crack about how refreshing it was to finally find something she kind of sucked at. And all the while Lydia was literally skating circles around them, a supremely self-satisfied look on her face.

Slowly, that nervousness and anxiety that had begun to build up inside of her over the last few weeks began to leak away. She made the active decision to let it go, for now at least. All of it. Life was a series of moments, one after the other, and she decided to forget about all the ones before and not think about the ones coming after her. Charlie paused for a moment in the middle of the rink and looked at everyone around her. Allison was slowly guiding Scott around, trying her damnedest to keep him from falling on his ass and failing miserably, Lydia was skating backwards and doing spins with impossible grace and a giant smile plastered on her face, and Stiles was intermittently proposing a bunch of new hypotheticals to debate, each more ridiculous than the last. And in that one moment, she was just happy. That's all there was to it.

Ultimately, Charlie did get the hang of the skating thing. Scott didn't seem to though. He remained truly and hopelessly terrible the entire time. She began to think he was actively trying to skate into the walls. It happened so often, making fun of him almost stopped being fun. Almost. Eventually there was one fall too many and he and Allison shuffled off the ice to do something slightly less dangerous to Scott's health, leaving Charlie, Lydia, and Stiles all on their own.

Charlie skated to the wall and leaned against it, closing her eyes. She sucked in a deep breath, letting the crisp air fill her lungs before blowing it out again. Everything was quiet, in and out of her head. It had been so loud for so long, but it felt like she had finally gotten a moment's peace. Sure her life was pretty much in the crapper, but she could not be more grateful for the stillness she felt.

"It's nice to see that look on your face again," a voice said from next to her. Charlie opened up her eyes again to see Stiles leaning against the wall as well, an unreadable expression on his face.

"What look?" she muttered, looking at him with furrowed eyebrows.

Stiles shrugged and jerked his head to the side noncommittally. "I don't know," he muttered. "Calm, I guess. Carefree. Not with that constant look of slightly deranged worry. Happy. It's been a while since you looked like that."

"Yeah," Charlie murmured, nodding to herself. "It's been a while since I felt like that. I've been in my head so much these days I kind of forgot what being out of it was like."

"Hey, I know what you mean," Stiles said, shaking his head. "Sometimes I feel like I forgot what 'having fun' actually means."

"Thanks for this, Stiles," Charlie said, nodding to herself. "I mean it. Really. Thank you. The past forty-five minutes have been like a freaking oasis in the desert that is our lives right now. I didn't feel sick with fear once this whole time."

Stiles let out a snort and nudged her in the side with his elbow. "If that's not a ringing endorsement, I don't know what is."

"I'm serious," Charlie insisted, elbowing him right back. "I really needed to take a step back—get some perspective."

And then Stiles gave her a long look, clearing his throat and shifting slightly on his feet before speaking again. "Perspective is good," Stiles said, nodding at her. "It's good to look at things in a different light. I guess that's the upside of all the bad stuff that happens to us. It makes you realize what's important. And who's important, you know? And sometimes...sometimes you get to see something that you didn't see before. Like something's been there for the longest time and you never saw it until the universe made you."

"Yeah, I guess so..." Charlie murmured. But the sentence tapered off, devolving into nothing. Her focus was drawn to the center of the ice rink where Lydia was kneeling on the ground, brushing her hands across the ice like she was trying to clean it off. "What's happening over there?"

"I—wh—what?" Stiles stammered out, looking at her in confusion.

But before she had the chance to respond at all, an otherworldly sound erupted in the room, echoing against the walls of the rink and ringing in her ears. At first Charlie couldn't pinpoint the source of the noise. It blasted through her senses and made her lose her balance a little. It was only when she saw Lydia's contorted face that she knew what the sound was. It was a scream.

Charlie wasn't sure what happened next. It was like something in her brain malfunctioned—like the synapses started misfiring and all of the electrical connections in her brain began to misfire. However loud the sound coming from Lydia was, it faded into nothing like Charlie's head had been immersed in water. And then it was as if her consciousness had been removed from her body and she was being forced to watch everything on a TV screen. It happened in slow motion. Stiles ran towards Lydia, trying to hold her steady as she spasmed and shook while Charlie...she couldn't move.

For a second she could have sworn the ice rink was burning to the ground, but it was her mind that was on fire. She clapped her hands over her ears and opened her mouth to let out a scream, but no sound came out. She felt like she was paralyzed by the pain, but unable to do anything to help her or Lydia. Her knees buckled under her, making her collapse to the ground wordlessly.

Then Lydia's scream faded away, and the pain disappeared. It was almost like it was all a bad dream she couldn't wake up from, but now she could move again. Her mind suddenly returned to her. Charlie ripped off her skates and tossed them away, her feet slapping against the cold ice as she sprinted to Lydia. As she approached she collapsed on her hands and knees, almost colliding with Stiles as she skidded to a halt. "Lydia?" she demanded in a panicked voice. "L—Lydia what is it? Tell me!"

But Lydia didn't say anything. She continued to claw at the ice and whimper while Stiles had to hold her still, her face contorted into a terrified expression and tears running down her face. "I—I don't know what happened!" Stiles said, shaking his head in panic. "She just started screaming and—"

As Stiles looked up at her, any other words he might have had died in his throat, confusion and fear filling his gaze. "What?!" Charlie demanded harshly. "What is it?!"

Stiles blinked, like he wasn't sure what to say. "Y—your nose..."

It was then that Charlie felt the trickle of moisture running down her lip. She quickly swiped under her nose, wiping whatever it was away and not understanding Stiles's sudden look of concern. And then she looked down at her finger. It was covered in a thick, black liquid. Which left her with yet one more question to throw on top of the pile—a question that scared her shitless.

What was happening to her?

**CHAPTER 11 SOUNDTRACK**

**Just wanted to remind you guys that I actually have a Spotify account with the sountracks already organized. If you want to check it out, the link is on my profile.**

**Charlie gets her lunch and sees something slightly shady.**

**-~-~-~-~-~-~Forgotten Days - PAPA**

**Going to the ice rink and having fun.**

**-~-~-~-~-~-~Shinjuku Bride - Ecstasy**

**Stiles shows Charlie how to skate.**

**-~-~-~-~-~-~Harrison Ford - Somebody Still Loves you, Boris Yeltsin**

**Lydia collapses and Charlie starts bleeding black.**

**-~-~-~-~-~-~Wolf - Marika Hackman**


	12. Under Pressure

**Disclaimer: 'Teen Wolf' isn't mine. Shocking, right? But it's true. If there are any similarities in content or dialogue, it has probably originated with the show.**

**A huge thank you to leadmetothecross, meels234, SK-Scatenato, Devon Laurel, aliciasellers75, Gee Brittany, YelloSubmarine93, heroherondaletotheresuce, ofmiceandheidi, laura, Guest 1, Lia, Kat, katiesgotagun, Iwannabelikeme, Allie, Guest 2, Guest 3, Atomicity, SimplyKelly, TheMMMG, pennamethathasn'tbeentaken, DarlingPeterPan, My mother is a koala, catelikescats, nessafly, bagginsoftheshire666, MarvelWorksWonders, Undeniable Weirdness, Guest4, Anon Guest, Guest 5, WhatsGoingOn, Shes-The-Proto-Type, shy lady, Guest 6, Noxen, Guest 7, Guest 8, Tania, Guest 9, Marzipan, ellosaurus, zvc56, Micaela M, Hanna, Ava, Guest 10, Ayine, onethousandmoths, RedRoses5, melissax0, Bookiee, and KennedyRaye for reviewing.**

**Strap yourselves in guys. This one's gonna get crazy.**

Chapter 12 – Under Pressure

For a long time after her dad had died, Charlie wondered why he didn't tell her about the aneurysm. At first it was just her asking herself how he could have done that to her—how he could just abandon her without so much of a whisper of warning. She had hated him for a few days because of that. Why hadn't he needed her? Why hadn't he wanted her help? How could he rather go through all of that alone than tell her? She could have helped. She would have done anything—he must have known that. She would have made those last few months count. But still he didn't tell her. How useless did he think she was? It was like he had stuck a knife in her gut and twisted it around, leaving her empty and hollow.

But that was a long time ago. She had let all of that angst go. Most of it at least. And now, through some bizarre series of events, she actually began to understand exactly why he did what he did.

There's a look you get from somebody when they know there's something wrong with you. There's worry and pity and a whole lot of other things that add up into this one particular expression. They look at you like you're broken. Charlie had gotten used to something like that look after she had essentially become an orphan. It was usually paired with an 'I'm so sorry' or 'you poor thing' and more often than not came with some sort of offering of food. Right after it happened she and Mel had had enough lasagnas and casseroles in the fridge to last them a full month.

The point was, when something happened to you, people saw you differently. And you could see them seeing you differently. Suddenly you needed fixing. Suddenly they were worrying and waiting for the other shoe to drop. When it was people you barely knew, it was annoying as hell—an inconvenience—but nothing more than that. When it was somebody you really cared about, it was heartbreaking. Now she got it—she understood why her dad didn't tell her. Because she might have ended up looking at him the way Stiles was looking at her right now.

To say that the way they left things at the ice rink was awkward was more than a little bit of an understatement. Traumatic would actually have been more appropriate. In those few moments, with Lydia clawing at the ice and whimpering hysterically while black fluid oozed out of her nose, it felt like something in them broke.

By the time Lydia's screams had brought Allison and Scott sprinting back to the ice, Charlie had already wiped away all traces of supernatural interference, pulling down the sleeves of her jacket to cover her stained shirtsleeve. As they tried to get Lydia to calm down she didn't mention a thing about it. Neither did Stiles, but she could see him watching her out of the corner of his eye, that look of worry already taking root. When finally seemed to regain her senses, she retreated into herself, suddenly becoming quiet and insisting to be brought home immediately. Charlie was more than happy to oblige, wanting to get out of there and out of the line of scrutiny as quickly as possible. It didn't seem to work, though. It wasn't long before she and Lydia got on the road that she realized Stiles was behind her, Scott and Allison in tow, making sure that she and Lydia were both okay.

But Stiles didn't stop with that car ride home. Nope. He took the protectiveness to a whole new level. It started with the call after he got home. Then there were the multiple calls and messages she had received over Friday and the weekend inquiring after Lydia with the, 'and how are you doing?' oh-so stealthily tacked on after that. Charlie had hoped that with the new week the degree of scrutiny would lessen slightly, but she was wrong. There was a call Monday morning. Hell, the process continued after they had all arrived at school that day. The only time he took his eyes off her was to watch Lydia, and vice versa, like he was waiting for the both of them to flip out and have a breakdown at any moment. She could feel his eyes on her all through English, and even now in chemistry she could feel them burning a hole in the back of her head. Part of Charlie knew she should appreciate the concern he was showing, but she felt like she was being boxed in—suffocated. And she was scared. Because now that he thought there was something wrong with her, she couldn't avoid it anymore. She was forced to look at it.

Honestly Charlie didn't know if she could keep it together much longer. Monday mornings were frustrating enough without being constantly reminded that you were in the middle of a mental breakdown. Charlie was way too tired to be dealing with all this stuff. She was way too tired to be in freaking chemistry class. She tried to concentrate on what Harris was droning on about and what he was scribbling on the board, but she just couldn't. The sound of his voice didn't seem to reach her ears and no matter how hard she squinted at the chalkboard, all she could see were blurred scribbles.

"What a dick," a disturbingly familiar voice said from somewhere next to her.

As soon as she heard the words, Charlie felt her heart seize in her chest, a tsunami of panic crashing into her. It couldn't be who she thought it was. It couldn't. It wasn't possible. It was so far beyond possible. And yet it was. Her head whipped around, looking in the direction of the voice, finding herself staring at the perpetually smug Peter Hale.

"You know," Peter continued, staring at Harris, "I really should have killed him when I had the chance. I'd say that goes on my list of regrets. Not at the very top, but pretty high up. I mean the man is a sadist—don't pretend you don't agree." He looked over at her, smirking widely. "You do agree, don't you Charlie?"

Charlie opened and closed her mouth, gaping at him. "Y—you can't be here," she whispered. "This can't happen."

"Really?" Peter said, cocking his to the side and peering at her curiously. "I'm here aren't I? So it clearly can happen."

"You're dead," Charlie hissed.

"Yes," Peter drawled out, nodding at her like she was a small child. "Yes, I am. And you're sleeping."

Charlie's eyebrows pulled together and her head whipped around, her eyes darting about and observing her surroundings. She was definitely still in chemistry class, but something was off. The rest of her classmates were just staring blankly at the board, none of them questioning the fact that a thirty-something guy had miraculously appeared out of thin air. And all of that writing on the board—it didn't make any sense. The letters were all jumbled and mixed around, like she had suddenly become dyslexic.

"Seriously, Charlie," Peter sighed out, shaking his head at her. "Falling asleep in class? This is really out of character for you. I'm beginning to worry."

An embittered scoff forced its way out of her. "Sure you are."

"I'm serious," Peter protested, clapping a hand on her shoulder that made her flinch. "I know we've had our difficulties in the past, but I'm sure you've noticed we have a lot in common. You could …..you could say we're of the same mind."

At that lovely double entendre, Charlie rolled her eyes heavily and rubbed at her forehead. "Hilarious," she replied dully. "How long have you been holding onto that one."

"I thought it up a few days ago," Peter said with a shrug. "I thought it fit our current situation quite nicely." And then he leaned in towards her, studying her face with a grave expression. "I wasn't kidding when I said I was worried about you Charlie. You don't seem yourself lately. If you asked me you've stretched yourself a little too thin with everything going on. I wish there was something I could do."

"There is something you can do," Charlie growled violently, rounding on him. "You can tell me what the hell you did to me! You can tell me why I end up burning alive in your house ten times a week! You can tell me why I've started leaking ink out my nose! You can tell me why I've got to look at your stupid, smug face every freaking day!"

Peter didn't react to her explosion. He didn't even blink. Instead he sighed and shook his head, rubbing her back comfortingly. "I really wish I could, Charlie," he sighed, shaking his head at her. "But it's like I told you last time and the time before that. I….I am a figment of your exceptionally creative imagination. I might be able to make connections that your conscious mind doesn't, but I can't simply conjure up information out of nowhere."

Letting out a loud groan, Charlie let her head fall forwards, colliding with the surface of her desk. "That's just fantastic," she moaned to herself. "So not only am suffering from some sort of supernatural whammy, I'm also going batshit crazy."

Peter clucked disapprovingly. "Mental illness has such an unfair stigma in today's society. It's not your fault you're going insane."

"No," Charlie said, wrenching her head off the desk to glare at him. "It's yours."

"Don't be like that, Charlie," Peter whined. "You were my favorite. It really does pain me to see you so put out by all of this." He sighed and rubbed at his jaw, an expression of contemplation written across his face. "Man, I don't think I've been this bummed about something since Jack turned into a human popsicle at the end of 'Titanic'. I mean there really was enough space on that floating door for him _and_ Rose to escape that watery grave. What a waste of a beautiful love story."

Charlie froze. She forced her mind to go back and replay that sentence. That one, stupid, pointless, banter-y sentence. It didn't matter at all in the grand scheme of the conversation they were having, but it had just changed everything. Peter took notice of the sudden change in her countenance and peered at her curiously. "What is this?" he said, waving his hand in the general direction of her face. "What's happening here?"

Charlie smacked the hand out of her face and exhaled sharply. "I've never seen 'Titanic'."

"Really?" Peter scoffed, raising his eyebrows at her. "You're a teenage girl who's never seen 'Titanic'? What? Were you raised in a cave or something?"

Charlie didn't respond, instead just staring out in front of her and trying to reconcile what she had just discovered. Everything she thought she knew about her current 'state of mind' was wrong. She just couldn't decide if that was a good or a bad thing. Clearly getting frustrated with the lack of response, Peter began snapping his fingers in front of her face. "Earth to Charlie," he called out. "What's happening with you?"

The snapping of his fingers jolted Charlie out of her reverie. She turned to face him, her eyes wide with….excitement, apprehension, relief, fear? She wasn't quite sure. "I've never seen 'Titanic'," she repeated, looking at Peter pointedly.

"Yeah, I've heard," Peter said, nodding, speaking slowly, and just generally looking at her like she was an idiot. "It's regrettable but something that can be easily rectified. I'm pretty sure that it's on Netflix OnDemand. Unless they took it down which would be totally ridiculous. I mean why would they—?"

"I don't think you're understanding me," Charlie said, cutting him off. "I've never seen 'Titanic'. I didn't know how the movie ended."

Peter let out a snort and looked at her skeptically. "Really, Charlie? The movie is called 'Titanic'. I'm pretty sure a girl as clever as you can figure out how the movie ends. Boy meets girl….boat meets iceberg….."

"I don't know who Jack and Rose are," she said. "Or how they died."

"Well that's a shame," Peter said, shrugging regretfully. "They really were such a lovely couple."

He didn't see it. He didn't see his mistake—his slipup. He had lied to her and messed with her-even dead he kept making her life a living hell. But for the first time, she had gotten the drop on him. "Oh, come now Peter," Charlie murmured, shooting him a knowing smirk that was eerily reminiscent of his own. "Surely somebody as clever as you can figure out what I'm getting at."

"Illuminate me."

Charlie pulled her chair back, away from the desk, and positioned it so she was staring directly at him. "If I've never seen the movie 'Titanic' and you're just a product of an overly enthusiastic subconscious, how could you tell me about Rose and Jack and how they die? It's like you told me all those times. How could I tell myself something I didn't know in the first place?"

And then that look of comprehension dawned on Peter's face. He had caught up with her now. Charlie had expected some sign of disappointment on his part—she had just undone his weeks of emotional manipulation and psychological torture. He wasn't going to be able to sit there and make her doubt herself with all those little snide comments and suggestions. She wasn't his toy anymore. But Peter didn't seem upset. Instead he smiled, genuinely amused by the situation. "Foiled by Leonardo di Caprio," he muttered to himself before chuckling and shaking his head. "I've got to say, that's a new one. Even for me." He looked up at her with amusement. "It's stuff like this that makes you my favorite, you know."

"Wish I could say the same to you," Charlie snapped.

Peter sighed and leaned back in his chair, lounging with his hands behind his head. "I had you going for a while though. It was fun while it lasted."

At that point Charlie felt like she was about to explode with rage. She ground her teeth together so hard you could hear them grating against each other. "Shut up!" she practically shouted at him. "Shut up you arrogant, sadistic, vapid, narcissistic, smarmy—"

Peter let out a snort and gave her a funny look. "Smarmy? What am I, a pirate?"

"—cocky son of a bitch!" Charlie finished, glaring at him with eyes that spat fire.

"There's no need for name-calling," he mumbled.

Charlie felt her fist clench into a fist. It was itching to swing out and strike him across the face, but she thought better of it. He didn't deserve the dignity afforded by a closed fist. So instead she let it relax again, striking across the face with an open palm. A loud thwack resonated through the classroom and Peter's head shifted almost imperceptibly to the side. He was clearly surprised by the impact, his eyebrows shooting up until they almost disappeared into his hairline, but he didn't seem overly pained by the impact.

"Huh," he laughed to himself, nodding to himself almost as if in agreement. "Bitch slap. I probably deserved that." He narrowed his eyes at her, giving her an appraising look. "You have a pretty good arm on you. I appreciate that in a woman."

"How's about you appreciate it twice." Charlie brought her hand back to strike again, but this time Peter was expecting her. When her arm swung forwards, his hand darted out, grabbing it out of the air. He clucked and inclined his head at her, giving her an admonishing look. "Not so fast Charlie," he said with a dangerous smirk, baring his teeth at her a little bit. "You only get one."

A low growl rumbled in the back of Charlie's throat and she glared at him with as much intensity as she could muster. "What was the point of this?" she demanded, wrenching her arm out of his grasp. "What was the point of making me think I was crazy instead of just telling me why you're here?"

Peter sighed and shrugged his shoulders casually. "The same reason I do everything, Charlie. Self preservation."

"How exactly was this in service of self preservation?!"

Rolling his eyes at her, Peter shook his head in disappointment. "Think with your head, Charlie," he said, poking her in the forehead. "If you find out why I'm here, they you'll find out how to get rid of me. And frankly I'm not ready to shuffle off this mortal coil quite yet."

Charlie gaped at him in disbelief. "Shuffle off this mortal c—You're already dead!"

"Just because I'm dead doesn't mean I can't still have fun."

It felt like there was a pressure building up under Charlie's skin, like she was about to explode outwards. Though part of her felt like that might not be so much of a bad thing, since her blowing up meant that Peter would be gone too. Her hands tightened instinctively and the pencil she had been holding in her left hand snapped in two. She opened her mouth to open the verbal floodgates on Peter, but before she could a high-pitched sound filled the air. "Would you look at that," Peter smirked. "Saved by the bell."

Charlie tried to retort, but then she blinked.

It was as if something in the lighting had changed. What was initially soft and dare-she-say dream-like suddenly shifted into the harsh fluorescents she was so used to in school. She jumped slightly at the sound of chairs scraping against the floor and books being shut. The school bell had rung and everybody was gearing up for lunch. Charlie shook her head and tried to reorient her thoughts, and as she did her eyes fell on that pencil she had been holding in her hand. It was still intact.

Acting as normally as possible, Charlie snapped her notebooks shut and shoved all of her things in her bag. She tried to ignore the racing of her heart, but it was kind of difficult given the way the blood was pounding in her ears and the sweat that was beading up on her temples. And her breaths were coming out quick and short, making her feel like she was about to pass out. It was too much. It was all just too much. She had to get out—she needed air.

Charlie threw all of her things into her messenger bag with almost impossible speed and darted towards the door from her seat near the front of the room. She was pretty sure she heard Stiles calling out after her, but she ignored him, instead opting to rush off to the bathroom. Once she got there, she walked quickly through the place, kicking open all the stalls and making sure she was alone before returning to the front door and locking it. She began to pace back and forth, taking deep breaths and shaking out her arms in some futile gesture.

"Suck it up, Oswin," she said to herself, only this time it came out in a high-pitched, singsong tone. "Suck it up. You're being an idiot. You are being an idiot. It'll work itself out. It always does." And then she caught a glimpse of herself and that false confidence wavered. "Except for when it doesn't. And now I'm talking to myself. That definitely makes me feel more sane. Good job, Charlie." She rolled her eyes at herself. "And now I'm speaking to myself in the third person. Score one for Charlie. You're doing great!"

She probably would have gone on having that one-person conversation for a long, long time, but before she could there was a rattling noise at the door. Somebody was trying to get in. Charlie swore under her breath and kicked at the air. Of course someone was trying to get in. It was a girl's bathroom during lunch. Everybody would be trying to get in. Everybody with multiple X chromosomes at least.

"Um, excuse me?"

The voice at the door finally made Charlie stop pacing. Wincing heavily, she slowly turned and stared at the door. Maybe it was a hallucination. She had been having a lot of those lately, hadn't she? It could totally be a hallucination. Which meant she didn't have to bother with it. But then the fist pounded against the door again, louder and angrier than last time.

"Hello!' the voice shouted. "Let me the hell in!"

Ugh. It was freaking Meredith Edwards. "Hello!" the trill voice shouted even louder. "Do you speak English? I said let me in!"

"It's under maintenance!" Charlie shouted back in an uncharacteristically deep tone of voice. "Somebody tried to flush a baggy of diet pills down the toilet and it's overflowing. There's an end of days style flood in here. Trust me, you wanna use the one on the second floor."

Charlie paused for a moment, silently hoping that the intruder would go away quietly. Her ears perked, and pretty soon she her someone say 'ew' and the sound of heels clacking away, allowing her to exhale in relief. Finally, something had gone her way. It was a tiny, useless thing, but it was something. Maybe it was an upward trend. But then she happened to glance at her reflection in the mirror and that hope was snuffed out like a birthday candle in a torrential thunderstorm. It was small—almost inconsequential—but a small trickle of black was running from her nose, down her lip.

Charlie froze in place, staring at her distant reflection for a few moments before making a slow approach. She moved closer and closer to the mirror until her forehead was practically pressing against the cool surface, her breath fogging the glass. There was no mistaking it. It wasn't just a nosebleed. The liquid—whatever it was—was impossibly black. Reaching out, Charlie snatched one of the paper towels and wiped away the liquid frantically.

Staring down at the sullied paper towel, Charlie came to a conclusion. It was one she had probably needed to come to a long time ago. But that was the problem when you were an emotionally constipated and having major trust issues. You tended to keep pretty much everything to yourself, even if as an exercise in self-destruction. But now it was settled. As of right now she knew exactly two people who might be able to tell her something. She would start with the one she knew best, and then move on to the one she was still pretty damn suspicious of. Derek might have had an agenda Charlie didn't agree with, but at least she knew what it was. When it came to Deaton….she still didn't know a damn thing.

Turning on the tap, Charlie splashed some water on her face and sucked in a long breath. "Suck it up, Oswin."

Okay. That was it. That was all the pity party she could throw herself today. There was way too much else to do. Charlie sucked in a deep breath and braced herself before unlocking the door and striding out into the hallway. It had been a few minutes since the lunch bell rang, so the halls had emptied out for the most part, making Charlie grateful for the relatively peaceful walk to her locker. She walked up to the thing and quickly unlocked it. It was only when she went to unload her books that she realized she was still clutching that dirty paper towel in her hand.

"Hey, Charlie!"

The sudden appearance of Stiles's overly enthusiastic voice made Charlie jump with surprised. She swore under her breath and fumbled as she shoved the wadded up paper towel in her jacket pocket. She closed the door to her locker, only to find Stiles's face on the other side of it, an almost manic grin planted on his face.

"H—hey, Stiles," she murmured, readjusting the strap of her messenger bag on her shoulder. "What's up?"

"Nothin'," he replied, bobbing his head at her. "Just…you know…chillin'. Hanging out. Thought maybe you'd wanna grab lunch with me and Scott."

"Okay," Charlie said, nodding at him with no small degree of suspicion. Honestly, she should have expected this—him hovering and trying to find out what was going on. "You could have just waited in the cafeteria like you usually do."

"Yeah….." he drawled out, squinting at her with a vaguely guilty expression. "Well I'm already here, aren't I?" He jerked his thumb over his shoulder in the direction of the cafeteria. "You wanna walk?"

"Nah, I'm just going to stand here and slowly starve to death," Charlie replied with a smirk. "Sure, Stiles, let's walk."

Stiles nodded definitively and smiled, and the two of them began ambling down the hallway. And it was super awkward. The both of them were totally silent, staring straight ahead, and it felt like there was some sort of tension building up, magnifying their discomfort exponentially. Charlie clutched onto the strap of her messenger bag, holding onto it like it was a freaking security blanket. It was only when she shot a sideways glance at Stiles that she realized he was doing the exact same thing with the straps of his backpack.

"So," Stiles murmured, clearing his throat a bit as they walked. "How's—how's Lydia holding up? After everything that happened, I mean. At the rink she looked…well you were there." He made a face at her before continuing. "I mean did she say anything or do anything that—"

"No," Charlie replied, shaking her head. "No. I tried asking some leading questions, but it didn't really go anywhere. Lydia knows how to avoid the issue more than anybody else I've ever met."

"H—really?" Stiles scoffed, raising his eyebrows at her. "More than anybody else you can think of? Like anybody all? I find that a little hard to—" Charlie shot him a look that made his mouth snap shut immediately. But it was only a few more steps before it opened again. "So, uh, so how are you doing?" he asked scratching at the back of his neck with one hand and waving the other one around absently. "After the thing? "

Immediately Charlie felt herself go tense. Or, rather, tenser. "Fine," she replied quickly, folding her arms across her chest. "Totally fine."

"Okay."

Charlie doubted that Stiles believed her, but he didn't press the issue any further than that. She could tell he wanted to given the way his jaw was twitching, but he didn't. Probably because he knew he wouldn't get a straight answer out of her if he did. And for that Charlie said a silent 'thank you'.

The two of them finally pushed their way into the cafeteria. She glanced over at Stiles again, and he smiled again, giving her that weird little wave. Charlie nodded back, making a face at him. Why did he have to watch her like this? It was like he half-expected her to start laughing uncontrollably for no reason or curl up into a ball and start rocking back and forth whilst crying. She would have given pretty much anything to get him to stop looking at her. And then he did.

"Oh, shit," Stiles whispered under his breath.

Charlie blinked and furrowed her eyebrows in confusion. "What is it?"

Stiles didn't answer. Instead Charlie had to follow his line of vision until her eyes fell on a table. An empty table. At first she wondered what the big deal was. It was an empty table, whoopty-friggin'-do. But then she remembered yesterday—the conversation she had had and who she had had it with. And she made the connections.

"Oh, shit," she repeated.

The two of them exchanged a single glance and then took off running through the cafeteria. They dodged between the tables until they got to Stiles and Scott's usual spot. As they approached the table they almost ran directly into Allison, stomping off in the other direction with tears in her eyes. A big part of Charlie wanted to go after her and demand what was wrong, but there were other things she needed to deal with right now. Stiles clapped a hand on Scott's shoulder, making him look up at the both of them. Taking note of their panic, he furrowed his eyebrows in concern.

"Do you see that?" Stiles demanded, gesturing at the table a few over from them.

"What?" Scott asked, shrugging his shoulders a bit. "It's an empty table."

"Yeah, but whose empty table?" Stiles demanded, looking at him pointedly.

A whole host of emotions flitted across Stiles's face in those next few moments. Comprehension, fear, worry. And then he uttered a single word. "Boyd."

There were a hell of a lot of things Charlie wasn't certain of, but she did know one thing. She wasn't going to be eating lunch today. The rest of their lunch break and free period were spent tracking down as much information on Boyd as possible. Apparently he hadn't shown up for school that day. He was 'sick'. Which was pretty strange given the fact that he was perfectly fine when he had gotten on the bus to go to school this morning. Some time between getting dropped off in front of the school and first period, he had disappeared.

The bell for sixth period rang. Their time was up, and they still didn't have anything definitive. "What if he just decided to ditch class for the day?" Charlie posited weakly as they were forced to head to their next class. "What if it's just a crazy coincidence that he's missing?"

"Come on, Charlie," Scott mumbled, shaking his head. "It's never a coincidence. Haven't you noticed the pattern yet? It's always gonna be the worst possible alternative." Scott let out a groan and ran his hands down his face. "Derek needs three for a pack. He's trying to get Boyd—I know he is."

"Yeah, I know," Charlie mumbled back. She blew out a long breath and ran a hand through her hair. "Why can't we ever get a freaking day off?"

"So what's the plan?" Stiles asked, shoving his hands in his pockets as he walked.

Scott rubbed at the back of his neck, a pensive look on his face. "We find Boyd," Scott responded. "I'm going to go to the ice rink to see if he's there. Stiles, you can check and see if he's at his house. If he's not there, call me. Got it?"

Apparently Stiles didn't quite get it. A reluctant expression crossed his face and he slowed to a stop, making both Charlie and Scott halt as well. 'What?" Scott asked, eyeing Stiles carefully.

Stile exhaled sharply and looked up at Scott with a pained expression. "It's just…maybe we should let him have the bite," he said, wincing a bit. "Boyd, you know? You said Derek's giving them a choice, right?"

"Are you kidding?" Scott hissed, grabbing Stiles's arm and dragging him along as they continued by the household.

"He's not totally wrong," Charlie supplied, nudging Scott with her elbow. "I mean Erica doesn't seem to be hurting over the situation."

"Yeah," Stiles agreed. "You have to admit, Erica's looking pretty…..good. The word sensational comes to mind."

Charlie let out a scoff and nodded. "Um, yeah. Hell, even I would consider hitting that."

Stiles's head whipped and he stared at her with wide, shocked eyes. "Wait, what?"

"Guys!" Scott growled, demanding their attention. "How good do you think she's gonna look with a wolfsbane bullet in her head?!"

It was a fair point. Before Kate died, Charlie wouldn't be nearly as worried about all this. Because back then there was a code. Back then, it was at least kind of unacceptable to go around killing teenagers who hadn't done anything wrong. But now Gerard was here and all bets were off. It could be a bloodbath.

"Alright," Stiles said, gesturing at him to calm down. "All I'm saying is that this one isn't totally your responsibility."

Scott sighed and shrugged, an expression on his face like he was wrestling with something internally. "They all are," he finally said.

"Really?" Charlie demanded, her eyebrows shooting up. "How do you figure that?"

"I—I know this thing is going to get out of control," he replied definitively. "That makes me responsible."

Charlie would be lying if she said she wasn't impressed. She had known Scott a long time now, but she had never really taken the time to fully understand him. They were friends, but sometimes it seemed like that was more of a circumstantial type of friendship—one that had come to pass because he was Stiles's best friend and Allison's boyfriend. She hadn't learned all that much about him. Well today she learned one thing. He was a much, much better person than she was. He was noble.

"Alright," Stiles muttered, bobbing his head. "Alright, I'm with you. And so is Charlie."

"I am?" Charlie drawled out, making a face at him. Stiles smacked her in the arm and glowered at her, making Charlie nod in agreement. "Yes. Absolutely, I totally am."

"See," Stiles said with a smile, gesturing back and forth between the two of them. "You've got back-up. And I've also got to say that this newfound heroism is making me very attracted to you."

Scott laughed uncomfortably and shook his head. "Shut up."

Stiles grabbed Scott's shoulder and stared at his friend with hilariously soulful eyes. "Seriously. Do you wanna try making out a second? Just to see how it feels!"

Scott rolled his eyes and shoved at Stiles, forcing him a few more steps down the stairs. Charlie chuckled to herself and peeled away from the two of them, heading to sixth period. She held onto the strap of her messenger bag and took a deep breath. This day was shaping up to be a whole lot busier than she thought it would be. It made the American History class she was headed to seem kind of like a waste of time.

Charlie had barely taken a few steps down the hallway before hearing the sound of feet slapping against the ground, and as she did she felt her eyes fall shut. This was getting more than a little ridiculous. She didn't need to see the person to know who they were, and by the time she opened her eyes again that person had already caught up with her. Again.

"Hey!" Stiles said breathlessly, falling into step with her.

"What are you doing?" Charlie demanded, glancing at him out of the corner of her eye.

"N—nothing," Stiles said, jerking his head to the side noncommittally. "Just heading to class. Same as you."

"Stiles, your next class is on the other side of the building," Charlie retorted.

Stiles opened and closed his mouth a few times searching for a valid response to give her. "I'm, uh, I'm taking the scenic route," he stammered out. Then he cleared his throat loudly, scratching at the back of his neck. "S—so what time do you think we should head out to check in on Boyd? We could take your car if you want."

Charlie groaned internally and pinched at the bridge of her nose. She wasn't sure how much more she could take of this over-protective thing—of him treating her like she was a fragile porcelain doll that would shatter into a thousand pieces if you dropped it. That had been bad enough. Seeing him doubt her only ended up making her doubt herself. But now he was trying to take her afternoon, and she needed that afternoon. She had things to do—things she couldn't tell him about. Not yet anyway. But he kept pushing, and each time he pushed she felt her tension levels spike just a little bit more. It was like she was a simmering pot of water and someone was slowly turning up the heat degree by degree. Pretty soon she was going to boil over. And God help the person standing next to her when she did.

"I can't go to Boyd's house," she said in a tight voice, trying to come up with a plausible lie. "I promised Lydia we'd spend some time together."

Apparently this response was not one that Stiles was overly happy with. He grunted slightly, his eyebrows pulling together in confusion and worry. He really, really wanted to keep and eye on her. "Aw, come on!" he whined. "We're a team! Scott fights things and we do the detective work. We've got to….you know….detect. Let's go take care of Boyd. Come on."

Then he shot her this weird, puppy-dog pleading look. Under normal circumstances she would have thought it was totally adorable and resented him for making her feel fuzzy, fluffy feelings, but this time all she felt was frustration. She stopped short, making him stop as well, confusion written into his face. Sighing loudly, Charlie readjusted the strap of her bag on her shoulder. "I know what you're doing," she said bluntly.

Stiles let out an uncomfortable laugh and folded his arms across his chest, bouncing up and down on the balls of his feet with an impossible amount of energy. "I…..I don't know what…you're talking about."

Charlie rolled her eyes heavily. "Please, Stiles," she scoffed. "You know exactly what you're doing. After what happened at the rink you're…you're freaking monitoring me! I can feel you—" she gestured at her eyes "—watching me like all the time! It's driving me insane!"

Stiles blew out a long breath and his head sagged on his shoulders. When he raised his head again, that feigned innocence was gone. Instead his eyes only held concern. "Look, I—I'm worried, okay," he said, taking a tiny step towards her. "It's not exactly unreasonable for me to be worried."

"You're right," Charlie said with a single nod. "You know what is, though? Watching my every freaking move like you're afraid I'm going to pull a full-on Linda Blair and start spider walking everywhere!"

"Wha—that's not what I'm doing!"

"Yes it is!"

Stiles shoved his fist in his mouth to stifle a quiet scream of frustration before turning back to her. "Charlie, you had black stuff coming out of your nose!" he shouted, waving at her face. "That is not normal! That is not good!" He leaned forwards, looking her straight in the eye. "It's okay to let other people take care of you sometimes."

It was all just too freaking much. Why did it have to be Stiles that was standing next to her while she unraveled? She was going to snap—she could feel that fear and unnecessary hostility building up inside her. It was like she was a rubber band that had been stretched just a little too far. When she finally released that tension, the rubber band would snap and hit somebody in the eye or something. That somebody was going to be Stiles.

The words spilled out of Charlie's mouth before she even realized she was saying them. "I don't need anybody to take care of me, okay?" she snapped. "I can take care of myself. I was doing way before I met you and Scott and Lydia, I can still do it now. So can you just leave me alone for like two seconds? Is that something you think you could do?!"

Stiles twitched violently at her harsh words, looking like he had just been slapped across the face. Charlie immediately spun on her heel and began walking to her next class, her movements forced and robotic. It was that expression on Stiles's face. She just….couldn't look at it. He was hurt—she had hurt him—and now she was hating herself for it. This time she didn't hear footsteps chasing after her. Stiles was doing exactly what she had asked him to—he was leaving her alone. And that left her feeling hollow.

There was something wrong with her, but it wasn't Peter that had done it. No, she had been broken long, long before he shoved his claws in the back of her neck. It was like she was walking around in this emotional bubble. There was this line of emotional intimacy that she would never let them cross. And when someone did try and get closer to her, she would shove them back. She kept secrets from everybody—from Lydia, from Mel, from Stiles. But Stiles was the only one who kept pushing anyway, and then Charlie turned into a scared, cornered animal. Cornered animals lashed out.

The rest of the day, Charlie just went through the motions. She wrote down the notes and actually paid attention in class for once, except for when her mind strayed back to that look on Stiles's face and she was hit with another wave of crushing regret. Really it was just a giant countdown until she could get in that car and drive off in search of a couple of answers. As soon as that final bell rang she was on her feet and running to her car.

It took a while to find her way to the abandoned Railroad Depot. It was kind of in the middle of nowhere, situated in a small cluster of buildings that all looked the same. They were all grey, washed out, and covered in dust and the streets were hopelessly confusing in the way they wound about. So the place was basically suited to Derek's personality then. Grim and confusing. She was driving around for a full twenty minutes before she finally caught sight of that black Camero, its gleaming surface contrasting starkly with the rest of the surroundings.

Charlie pulled up to the building and threw into park, but didn't get out of the car. She stared at the cold metal door that led into the Railroad Depot. There could be answers on the other side of that door. Answers that she needed but might not want to hear. "Suck it up, Oswin," she whispered to herself. She reached up to the rearview mirror, removing the St. Christopher medallion that was hanging from it, and slipped the chain around her neck, getting that small little bit of protection before getting out of the car. She stood straight as she walked to the door, summoning up as much confidence as she could. There was a moment of hesitation as she lifted her fist to knock on the door, but she let her hand rap against the cold metal.

On the other side of the door, Charlie heard the sound of approaching footsteps. When the door swung open violently, she was surprised to see who was on the other side. She had been expecting hair gel, broody eyes, and a scowl. What she was presented with was wavy blonde hair, pouty lips, and a scowl. As soon as Erica's eyes registered Charlie standing there, a sneer pulled at her lip. She looked Charlie up and down with an expression of contempt. "It's you," she said bluntly.

"Yup," Charlie said, popping the 'p'. "I'm me. And you—" she gestured over at Erica "—you're you. We are who we are." Charlie folded her arms across her chest and bounced up and down on the balls of her feet, waiting to be let in. But Erica didn't move, opting to bock the entrance and glare at Charlie some more. "Um, I think this the part where you invite me in," Charlie whispered conspiratorially.

But Erica didn't make a move. Charlie was beginning to feel like she was being studied—measured up. Finally Erica sashayed forwards, popping her hips and sultriness just generally oozing out of every pore. "Why do people like you?" she asked, cocking her head to the side.

Charlie blinked at the question. She had only ever spoken to Erica a few times, but she had always been soft-spoken and, well, nice. She knew there was this adage about first impressions and all that, but from where she was standing the new and improved Erica was kind of a bitch. So she narrowed her eyes at the girl and glared right back. "What kind of question is that?"

"Oh, was it too confusing for you?" Erica said, batting her impossibly dark lashes as she looked at Charlie with an expression of false innocence. "Let me repeat myself. Why does everybody seem to like you? Because I've thought about it, and I really don't get it."

Charlie let out a strangled laugh and slapped a hand over her mouth to hold it back. This apparently wasn't the reaction Erica had expected. She even took a small step backwards. "You're kidding, right?" she snorted, looking up at Erica. "The public opinion on me is pretty much fifty-fifty. Sixty-forty if I'm in a good mood. And I'm rarely ever in a good mood." Then it was her turn to study Erica, soaking in all the hostility that seemed to be directed at her for no apparent reason at all. "Or are you talking about a particular subset of 'everybody'?"

Erica didn't respond. She just leaned against the doorframe and stared at Charlie like she was trying to set the girl on fire with her mind. It was like they were in the middle of a staring contest, but Charlie had no idea what the freaking endgame was. All she knew was that Erica Reyes inexplicably hated her. Like a lot.

"Erica, just let her in," Derek's voice echoed from behind the door. "She's not going to leave until she gets what she came here for. We might as well get it over with."

Rolling her eyes and letting out a low growl, Erica shot Charlie an insincere smile and pushed the door open, allowing Charlie inside. Charlie actually felt a small degree of apprehension walking into that room. She couldn't describe it as a house or an apartment or even a living space. Nope, the thing was a straight up lair complete with trip hazards and shitty lighting. It looked like the 'after' photo in one of those post-apocalyptic movies. And, of course, Derek was standing at the center of the room, arms crossed over his chest with his feet planted far apart, generally assuming the stance one might expect from a bouncer or a member of the secret service, Isaac standing a few feet behind him.

"Look who decided to drop by," Erica said snarkily ambling behind Charlie as she ushered the other girl into the room. "It's Charlie. And it looks like she didn't bring a housewarming gift."

Charlie let out a Lydia-like scoff of disappointment and shook her head at Erica. "Come on," she drawled out dryly. "Everybody knows you don't get a housewarming gift until you know what the décor looks like. Otherwise it might clash. Next time I'll be sure to pick up some loose pipe or a bucket of rusty nails on the way here."

Derek didn't react at all, but Charlie was pretty sure she heard a snort come from where Isaac was standing behind him. That one tiny sound, and suddenly Erica was rolling her eyes with even more intensity than before. "Erica, go do what you need to do," Derek said cryptically, nodding at the blonde. Erica smirked and nodded to him before spinning on her heel and heading back towards the door. But not before she could shoot Charlie one last withering glance.

"Hey, congratulations on the boobs by the way," Charlie shouted at the girl's retreating figure, giving her a double thumbs-up. "They look seriously awesome." Erica sneered at Charlie before wrenching open the front door and stepping through it. It slammed shut, an echo reverberating through the lair. Charlie exhaled sharply and raised her eyebrows. "Wow. She seriously hates me."

"Well you tend to have that effect on people," Derek said, slowly walking towards her. "What did you do to her?"

Charlie threw her hands in the air as a gesture of self-defense. "For the first time in recorded history, I can say with complete confidence that I have done absolutely nothing."

Derek chuckled bitterly and continued to walk towards her. "So I see you've found my new home," he said, waving his hands around the room to indicate.

"Um, yeah," Charlie said, glancing around her stark surroundings. "I like it. It's….minimalist. I mean who needs Wifi, right? Toss in a rug and some throw pillows and it'll be downright homey."

"Mm-hm," Derek murmured, nodding at her. "And how exactly did you find my home?"

Charlie snorted and waved her hand dismissively. "It was easy. I just Googled 'places to brood in Beacon Hills' and this was the top hit."

"Hilarious," Derek deadpanned. "How did you actually find your way here?"

Charlie opened and closed her mouth a few times, searching for a reason, and her eyes flitted to Isaac for a moment. "I—"

"I told her," Isaac interrupted, walking forwards a few steps.

She didn't think it possible, but Derek's spine straightened even more. "You told her?" he said with a tone of accusation.

"A few days ago," Isaac replied, looking a tiny bit scared.

At Isaac's confession, Derek's eyes fell shut. He was wearing an expression clearly stating that he very much wanted to hit someone straight in the face. "You told her?" he demanded, his voice low and gravelly. "Why would you tell h—You know what? No. I don't wanna know." He groaned loudly and looked over at Charlie. "I guess you're here to talk to him?" he asked, jerking his head in Isaac's direction.

Charlie glanced back and forth between the two of them awkwardly. Isaac had a strange, uncharacteristically confident smirk on his face while Derek generally looked like he'd rather be anywhere but in that spot. Charlie wasn't sure what either of them expected from her, but this situation was ending up even more awkward than she had anticipated. And that was saying a lot. "Uh, no," she replied. The reactions she got were interesting. Derek was surprised and Isaac seemed a little….disappointed? Charlie opened and closed her mouth a couple of times, but soon enough she turned to Derek with a serious expression. "I need to talk to you. About recent events that are having very real consequences."

"Did Scott send you here?" he demanded, advancing on her a bit. "Did he ask you to talk me out of it? Because if he thinks you're going to make any kind of difference then he's—"

"Please," Charlie said, holding her hand up to cut him off. "I know better than to try and talk you out of it. I'll just have to stop you the old fashioned way."

"And what's the old fashioned way?" Derek asked, raising his eyebrows at her.

Charlie shrugged her shoulders primly and cocked her head to the side. "By force. Obviously."

A snort forced its way out of Derek's nose and he shook his head at her. "That's cute. But if that's what you're here to tell me, then—"

"I'm not here to talk about Boyd," she interrupted. "I'm here to talk about Peter."

With the mention of that one name, everything seemed to immediately become grimmer. It was like somebody had superimposed an Instagram filter on her life, making everything she saw inherently more depressing. Maybe it was because of Derek's face. There was one point in her life when she thought he had only one expression, and while that was still true she had learned to recognize slight variations on that one expression. And the one she was looking at now? It showed no small degree of anxiety.

"Hold up, who is Peter?" Isaac interjected.

Derek turned to Isaac, a serious expression on his face. "Leave."

"W—what?" Isaac stammered, looking back and forth between Derek and Charlie. "Why do I have to leave?" Derek slowly turned his head to glare at Isaac, making Isaac twitch slightly. "Yeah, I'll—" he jerked his thumb in the direction of the door "—I'll just go then. Yup."

Isaac nodded at Charlie one more time before slowly ambling out the door, shooting glances over his shoulder as he went. When the front door finally closed behind him, Derek turned to Charlie and inclined his head to the right, indicating for her to follow him. He led her into what looked like an old, abandoned subway car and took a seat. Charlie lingered standing for a moment before settling for the seat opposite his.

"Okay," Derek said, clapping his hands together. "You've caught my interest. What about Peter?"

Then Charlie froze. She hadn't thought it through to this part. Up until now it had all been theoretical, the whole looking for answers thing. She knew she had to do it, but now that she was faced with the prospect of actually opening her mouth and saying the words out loud, she froze up. Derek noticed her hesitation and rolled his eyes. "Any day now. I've kind of got a schedule lined up."

Charlie bit her lip and nodded in understanding. "Okay," she whispered. "Okay." She cleared her throat and ran her hands down her face. Where the hell was she supposed to start? She wasn't just going to blab the whole thing—not to Derek. There wasn't enough trust between the two of them for that. So instead she opted not to say a word. She reached into her pocket and pulled out that wadded up paper towel, tossing it across the subway car. Derek snatched it easily out of the air. "What's this?" he asked, waving it around a bit.

"That's what I came here to ask you," Charlie replied.

Derek's eyebrows pulled together in confusion and he unwadded the paper towel, straightening it out until he saw the blackness staining it. Then something in his demeanor changed. "Where did you get this?" he demanded.

"Tell me what it is and I'll tell you where I got it," Charlie returned.

Derek's jaw twitched in frustration, but he looked back down at the paper towel. "The question isn't so much where you got it as who you got it from," he growled. "I don't know what it is exactly or why it happens, but when someone rejects the bite they start leaking this stuff like crazy." He tossed the paper towel back to her and leaned forwards, resting his elbows on his knees and staring at her intently. "So where exactly would you get something like this?"

Under his scrutiny, Charlie shifted uncomfortably in her seat. Derek was smart enough to put two and two together. "You?" he demanded. "It came from you? How is that possible? Peter didn't bite you."

Charlie sighed and shook her head. "No, he didn't," she admitted. "But he did do this." She got up from her seat and shrugged off her jacket, pulling a curtain of hair out of the way to reveal the back of the neck. The scabs had long since fallen off, but the marks were still there. Now they were just some discoloration of the skin and knotted scar tissue.

At that point Derek blew out a long breath, resting back in his seat. "Memory transfer," he muttered.

"What do you know about those?" Charlie said, letting her hair drop and sitting back down. "Any….long term effects?"

He narrowed his eyes curiously. "What kind of effects?"

Charlie ground her teeth together, reluctant to continue any further. They were getting to the meat of the issue now. "I don't know," she mumbled evasively. The next few words came out quickly, like she was rushing through them so he couldn't fully here. "Flashbacks, hallucinations, unbearable pain that can come and go at any moment. Does….does any of that sound familiar?"

Derek paused for a moment, rubbing at his jaw in contemplation. "You've been experiencing all that?"

The only response she gave was an imperceptible nod. And then the strangest thing happened. A look of worry crossed Derek's face. That couldn't be a good sign. "Yeah," Charlie said loudly, trying not to go into full-on panic mode. "Yeah, there's a virus in the hard drive that is my brain. And I'm asking for help. So why don't you crack open that 'How to Be an Alpha' manual and tell me how to fix this. Please."

A long silence stretched between the two of them while Derek took in the information she had just thrown at him. He sucked in a deep breath and then blew it out, sinking lower in his seat. "There is no manual," Derek sighed, rubbing at the back of his neck with his forehead creased in thought. When he looked back up at her, his eyes held regret. "My family had more of an oral tradition when it came to our mythology, passed on from generation to generation. Most of it's gone now."

So this was the Derek's nice way of telling her he couldn't do anything for her. At that moment it was like somebody had pricked that tiny bubble of hope with a needle, making it pop. Great. Fantastic. She finally admitted it all out loud, and what had it gotten her? A whole lot of nothing. Living these days was like trying to eat soup with a fork—you do everything you have to, you put in all the effort, and you still didn't get anywhere. Hope was slipping away from her. Charlie felt her eyes begin to ache as tears formed behind them, but she pushed those tears back. There was no way in hell she was going to let Derek see her cry.

Clearing her throat, Charlie got up to her feet. "Don't—don't tell anybody why I was here."

"I was never very talkative."

Charlie pressed her lips together in a thin line and nodded at him before turning to climb out of the subway car, but before she could get very far, Derek's voice stopped her. "Where are you going now?" he asked.

Charlie paused at the door and looked back at Derek over her shoulder. "Last ditch effort," she replied with a shrug.

Derek pushed himself up to his feet and took several steps towards her, folding his arms across his chest. "I'll see if I can find anything out."

And that was it. The two of them were never all that great at the communicating. But for some reason she felt like the two of them had a sort of understanding. She might annoy the hell out of him, but somehow they always ended up helping each other out. As far as relationships went, it really didn't make all that much sense. But then again nothing made all that much sense these days. After murmuring a quiet 'thank you', Charlie climbed out of the subway car and walked briskly back to her car, shoving the keys in the ignition and taking off down the road. She had one last stop to make.

By the time she reached Deaton's office, the sign on the door had been flipped to indicate that the place was closed, but Charlie could tell that he was still there. A car was parked just outside the front door and there was still a light on in the back. It was getting late, though. He probably wouldn't be there for much longer. The sun had started sinking below the tree line, scattering the rays like a mosaic of light as it cut through the branches. As she had with Derek, Charlie found herself sitting in her car outside Deaton's office for a long time, hands gripping the steering wheel and eyes fixated on the door. It was her last chance. If this didn't work, she wasn't sure what else would. With uncertainty, there was at least still the hope that something might be able to help her. Certainty scared the crap out of her.

Eventually she made herself get out of that car and walk towards the front door. Despite the closed sign, it wasn't locked. She pushed the door open, a bell tinkling slightly as she entered, and looked around. The last time she had been here was when Derek decided to torture this guy for information about the alpha. She hadn't really registered what her surroundings looked like that time, but now she saw that it was quite cozy—the front at least. Wood paneling and cushy chairs…it seemed almost inviting. "We're closed," a generally benevolent-sounding male voice said. "I'm afraid you'll have to come back tomorrow at normal business hou—"

Deaton rounded the corner that led to the front waiting area, cleaning out some sort of beaker, and stopped short when he saw Charlie standing there. Charlie lifted her hand in an awkward wave of greeting. "Hello," she mumbled quietly. "I'm Charlotte Oswin. I'm a friend of—"

"A friend of Scott's," Deaton finished for her, smiling kindly. "Yes, I—I remember you from that bit of unpleasantness earlier what with my kidnapping, et cetera. It's good to see you."

"It's good to see you too," Charlie nodded. "Especially when you're not covered in your own blood."

It probably wasn't the best thing to say when you're trying to make a good impression, but Deaton just laughed and nodded. "Yes, well that is the general state in which I prefer to keep myself." He finished wiping down the beaker and placed it gently on the front desk. "So what brings you to my offices tonight, Charlie?" he asked, clapping his hands together.

Charlie sighed and scratched at the back of her neck uncomfortably. Honestly, the guy looked trustworthy. And she knew Scott trusted him, and that wasn't nothing. As with all things, she was hesitant. But she had exhausted all other elements by now. "I need your help," she said bluntly.

"Alright," Deaton said with a small frown. "Where's the animal in qu—"

"That's not the kind of help I need," Charlie interrupted. "I need….the other type of help."

The frown on Deaton's face deepened, causing creases to form in the lines of his face. "I'm not sure that I catch your meaning."

Charlie squeezed her eyes shut and bounced up and down on the balls of her feet. He was being intentionally obtuse and trying avoid the topic. Well she wasn't going to let him. "Mountain ash?" Charlie supplied, looking at him poignantly. "Scott told me how you drove off Peter that time. It took me about four hours to dig up anything on mountain ash in werewolf mythology. Which means you know something. A lot, if I'm guessing correctly."

One corner of Deaton's lips pulled up into a half-smile. It was a knowing look—the look of someone who had been found out, but didn't quite mind that he had been found out. "And why would you have to guess."

"Like I said earlier," Charlie muttered, reaching into her pocket and pulling out that wadded up paper towel for the second time the evening. She held it up in front of Deaton, who blinked with surprise and concern. "I need your help."

Silently, Deaton stepped forwards and took the paper towel from her, studying it carefully. "This is a liquid exuded from those trying to expel elements of the supernatural from their own body," he stated, studying the paper carefully. "It's like if you have a splinter embedded in your body, the human immune response is to surround it with white blood cells and slowly push it out of the body. The dead white blood cells and bacteria form a white fluid you think of as pus."

"You're saying that black stuff is the supernatural version of pus," Charlie said, her nose wrinkling at the thought.

"It's an analogy," Deaton mused, still looking at the paper. "When it comes to the supernatural nothing is so simplistic. But it is a symptom of the body trying to expel something that doesn't belong there." He looked up at her curiously and lifted the bit of stained paper in the air. "This came from you?"

Charlie couldn't find it in her to say yes, so she just nodded.

"Were you bitten?" Deaton asked.

Charlie shook her head no.

Deaton rubbed at his jaw in contemplation. "What happened?"

Then Charlie repeated the process she had in the subway car. She shrugged out of her jacket, pulled her hair out of the way, and turned around, allowing Deaton to see it. She heard a few soft footsteps as he approached her and then felt four fingertips pressing into the skin, each covering one of her scars. "The alpha did this to you?" Deaton asked.

"Yeah," Charlie nodded.

"And since then you've been experiencing flashbacks, hallucinations?"

Charlie took a step away from the man and whipped around, eyeing him with fear, suspicion, and some degree of hope. "Yes."

"Have you been seeing Peter Hale?" he asked, looking at her with kindness, probably to lessen her anxiety.

Charlie bit her lip and nodded. "Yes. When I'm asleep."

Deaton directed a somber nod in her direction, and Charlie felt her heart seize up. This could be her solution. Or it could be her end. "When the alpha engages in this type of memory transfer, he or she must form a psychic link with the person they are imposing themselves on," Deaton explained. "It was primarily used as a means of communication within the pack—it was a way of bringing them closer together and cementing the relationship. Wolves within a pack already share a degree of connection, which makes such a transfer easier. Humans, however—"

"The connection was forced on me," Charlie elaborated, looking at Deaton to see if she was correct.

Deaton smiled comfortingly and nodded. "The link Peter Hale created between the two of you was artificial, and therefore more traumatic. When he transferred his memories to you, he might have left something else behind."

She needed to sit down. She really needed to sit down before she fell over. Charlie moved over to one of the chairs of the waiting room and sank into it, accepting the embrace of the plushy cushions. She took in long, steadying breaths and forced herself not to panic, but when she looked back up at Deaton, she knew her eyes betrayed her. "So you're saying that Peter Hale's mind is existing in a part on mine?" she whispered.

"No," Deaton said, shaking his head. "Not exactly. If his consciousness was entirely in yours, the effects would be stronger. You would be seeing him while you were awake. The two of you would be fighting for control of your waking self. This…think of it as an echo. A photocopy of a photocopy of the original image. But there still is an element of his consciousness that has taken hold of yours."

"Well is there any way to get him out of here?" she asked, tapping a finger against her forehead. "Like some sort of supernatural lobotomy? Seriously. He just keeps talking and talking. I kind of want to shove an ice pick in my ears to make him shut the hell up."

Deaton's jaw twitched and he began to pace back and forth a little bit. "In theory, the link should fade with time," he murmured. "He is the interloper, and your mind has begun to try and push him out eventually. But—"

"No," Charlie said shaking her head vehemently. "I don't like the sound of that 'but'."

"But from what you told me the link between the two of you seems exceptionally strong," Deaton elaborated. "You see him whenever you fall asleep?"

Charlie nodded.

"Given the event of Peter Hale's death this is…..unusual. He's gone. It should have faded rapidly, but the effect seems even more prolonged than it would typically be."

Charlie swore loudly and let her head fall forwards, holding her face in her hands. Footsteps drew closer to her and she felt a hand grip her shoulder. When she looked up Deaton was crouched in front of her, looking at her with an expression of sympathy. And finally that wave of exhaustion Charlie had been fighting off for so long crashed into Charlie, leaving her limp and useless. "I—I just don't think I can keep this up for much longer. I'm barely keeping it together as it is. I'm tired all the time."

Deaton nodded in understanding. "The human mind was built for one person," he murmured. "Adding another one expends more energy than you're accustomed to giving."

"And there's no cure," she whispered, sounding slightly desperate. "There's nothing I can do."

The man shrugged and patted her on the shoulder before getting back to his feet. "Just because there's no cure doesn't mean we can't do anything." Charlie watched as the man wandered through the door leading to the back of the clinic. She heard the sound of clinking glass and he returned holding some sort of blue bottle in his hand. He handed it to Charlie and allowed her to inspect it carefully. It contained some sort of clear liquid and the cap was attached to some sort of eyedropper. "One drop in each eye before bed," Deaton said, pointing at the bed. "It won't make Peter go away, but it'll let you have a deeper sleep and mitigate some of the adverse effects. And it does wonders for conjunctivitis."

Charlie peered up at the man with narrowed eyes. "I don't have conjunctivitis."

"And you definitely won't develop it," Deaton nodded firmly. "Not while you're using this."

Charlie lifted the glass to the light, inspecting it. "Hm. Unexpected perks."

She stared at the bottle for a long time, unsure of what to make of it. Combating the supernatural with the supernatural made sense, but she wasn't all that eager to start dumping a mystery liquid into her eyes to accomplish it. Especially when she wasn't certain of its source. Deaton apparently noticed her trepidation. "Do you trust me, Charlie?" he asked.

Charlie looked up at him and shook her head. "No. Not particularly."

The remark could be taken as offensive, but Deaton just chuckled and nodded in understanding. "That's good. The man who trusts blindly is a fool. But the man who trusts no one is also a fool. I'm not asking you to trust me, but I'm asking you to believe that I mean you no harm. You can use that or not—it's up to you. I'm just asking that you take it."

The two of them looked at each other for a long time. He seemed genuine, and she certainly wanted to believe him. But she still didn't know Deaton very well—none of them did. He had a lot of secrets and was apparently good at keeping them. The main thing she had learned from this conversation was that he knew far, far more than any of them could have expected. He certainly knew more than Derek. And she found that suspicious. But still, she took that bottle and tucked it into her messenger bag. "Thank you," she murmured under her breath.

"It was my pleasure," Deaton replied.

Charlie opened her mouth to say something else, but before she could her phone started going off, blasting out the tune of 'White and Nerdy' by Weird Al. She looked up at Deaton in some form of apology, but he waved her off. "By all means," he said, indicating for her to answer her phone. Charlie rooted around in her bag until her fingers found their way around her phone. Punching the 'send' button, she held it up to her ear.

"Hello?"

"Hey, Charlie," Stiles's reluctant voice said into the receiver.

Upon hearing his voice again, another swooping sensation of guilt settled in the pit of Charlie's stomach. "H—hey," she muttered, glancing at Deaton self-consciously. "What's up?"

"This isn't me checking in on you or anything," Stiles assured her. "I know you can take care of yourself."

"Stiles—" Charlie interjected, her lips trying to form some sort of apology for her snapping at him earlier, but before she could, he cut her off.

"Look, I'm just calling because I…I kind of need a favor," he murmured.

"Y—yeah," Charlie stammered out. "Yeah, sure. Anything."

"So I went over to Boyd's like Scott said," Stiles mumbled, sounding more than a bit self-conscious himself. "Erica was there. She sort of knocked me out and tossed me in a dumpster like two miles from my Jeep. Do you think I could get a ride back? Scott's not answering his phone and—"

"Yes," Charlie agreed immediately, nodding her head. "Yeah, just—just tell me where to pick you up and I'll be there as soon as possible."

"I'm at the corner of Fern and Jefferson."

"Okay," Charlie replied. "Okay, I'll meet you there."

She hung up the phone and looked at Deaton to take her leave, but he lifted a hand to stop her. "Go do what you need to do, Charlie. I'm sure I'll be seeing you again."

After saying a quiet 'thank you' Charlie ducked out of the clinic and climbed into her car, taking off down the road. As she drove, her hands gripped the steering wheel tightly, making the movements of the car kind of jerky and uncoordinated. This had possibly been the longest day of her existence. The frustrations of the past few weeks had reached their peak and she had finally found the answers she needed, but it didn't get her anywhere. Peter would still be in her head for the foreseeable future, Lydia was still suffering, Derek was still turning kids left and right, the Argents were still after them all, and she had taken it all out on Stiles. The one person who noticed that she wasn't totally okay in the first place. She was a terrible person, and a really shitty friend.

When she pulled up to the corner of Fern and Jefferson about five minutes later, Stiles was already standing on the corner, waiting for her. He wordlessly got in the car and she took off in the direction of Boyd's house and his Jeep. Not a single word passed between the two of them the whole time. There were plenty of glances exchanged and it was clear that they both _wanted_ to say something, but neither of them could come up with the words. Charlie could feel the tension building and building the closer they got to their destination, but even as Charlie pulled her car up next to his, neither of them had said a thing. Stiles unbuckled his seatbelt and reached for the door handle, but before he opened it he turned back to face her. "Uh, thanks," he mumbled awkwardly. "For the ride I mean. Thanks."

Charlie clenched her teeth and nodded. "Yeah. No problem. Any time."

Stiles nodded at her one more time and opened the door, climbing out of her car. Charlie lingered in her seat for a few more moments. There was a progressive tightening in her chest that made it difficult to breathe. She could leave things with Stiles like this. On impulse she threw herself out of the car as well. "Stiles, wait!" she called out after him, making him stop. She darted around her car so that she was standing directly in front of him. She shoved her hands in her pockets and stared down at her feet for a few moments and building her courage before she could look back up at him again. "I—I'm so sorry," she said earnestly, giving him a pleading look. "About snapping at you earlier. I…I didn't mean it, okay? I was a total bitch, and you didn't deserve that. You never deserve that. With everything that's happened lately I've just been wound so tight, and you were there when it became a bit too much and I put all my frustrations on you. It wasn't fair and it wasn't true. I—I'm just not used to letting people help me. Hell, I'm not used to people trying or even wanting to help me. This…this is all still a bit…new to me. The trust thing. I'm still not sure how it's supposed to work."

The whole thing felt more like a confession than an apology, with her laying a fair number of her fundamental character flaws out there on the table. For a few seconds she stood there, hoping that he would forgive her and terrified that he wouldn't. Her stomach was tying itself into knots as she waited. Then he exhaled sharply and shot her a tiny smile and she felt herself relax again. They always seemed to end up in this position—with him being generous and her lashing out at him. "Hey, it's okay," Stiles said, shrugging a bit. "I've been told that I can be a bit pushy sometimes. How about we forget about the whole thing?"

"Agreed," Charlie said immediately, nodding at him. She breathed out a sigh of relief, grateful that her ability to destroy pretty much any relationship hadn't gotten to this one too. "How's your head?" she asked, reaching up to lightly touch the raised bruise that was forming on his temple. "Have you been feeling dizzy or nauseous? Anything that might suggest a concussion?"

"Uh, no," Stiles mumbled, looking between her and her hand. And then something in his expression changed, making Charlie frown questioningly and pull her hand back. Stiles cleared his throat and shoved his hands in his pockets before speaking again. "So I'm gonna tell you something," he announced definitively.

"Okay…" Charlie drawled out, furrowing her eyebrows in confusion.

"It's a little heavy," Stiles continued, "so you're going to have to promise not to make fun of me.

Charlie winced heavily and shook her head at him. "Yeah, I can't do that."

"Wha—why the hell not?" Stiles spluttered in protest.

"I make it a rule not to make any promises I don't think I can keep," Charlie said with a prim shrug. "This definitely fits in that category."

"Ugh, I hate you so much," Stiles groaned, shaking his head at her. "Like seriously, you are the most impossible person I've ever met."

"Are you going to tell me or not?" Charlie demanded, folding her arms across her chest.

Stiles stared at her a few moments before staring off into the distance, his mouth hanging open in disbelief. It took him a couple of seconds, but he shook his head and continued. "Alright," he murmured, nodding to himself. "Alright." He shifted so that his shoulder was leaning against the car and he was facing her, an odd look of nervous determination on his face. "So—" he cleared his throat "—so Scott's my best friend."

"What?!" Charlie practically shouted, an expression of mock shock covering her face. "This is totally new information! I never would've—Stiles, you really need to give a warning before you drop an information bomb that huge. I'm reeling!"

Stiles glowered at her in frustration and let out a loud groan. "O—okay," he growled, holding a hand up to get her to stop. "Can you just, you know, behave like a normal human being for about thirty seconds instead of the sarcasm-fueled robot that you usually are? I haven't even said the initial thing that I was talking about saying in the first place! You are seriously impossible to talk to sometimes."

Charlie pressed her lips together in a thin line and shot him a sheepish smile. "Sorry," she muttered. "Proceed."

Stiles apparently had been expecting more sarcasm because he planted his hands on his hips and glared at her. "Well—!" But as soon as he registered her apology he blinked at her and narrowed his eyes in confusion. "Um, okay then," he murmured. He blew out a long breath and collapsed back against the side of the Jeep so they were standing shoulder-to-shoulder. "Like I was saying before you started getting all annoying….." he trailed off for a moment, suddenly wearing a serious expression. Charlie wrapped her arms tight around her waist. She told herself that it was just the coldness of the metal she was leaning against seeping through her clothes and making her cold, but for some reason she seemed nervous.

"Okay," Stiles said suddenly, seemingly with renewed determination. "So Scott's my best friend—has been since we were kids—but he hasn't been the one who's been there for me through all of the crap we've had to deal with." He fixed her with a meaningful stare, and Charlie felt like she was rooted in place. Those big, earnest brown eyes wouldn't let her move from that spot. "That's—that's sorta been you," Stiles continued, inclining his head in her direction before clearing his throat and scratching at the back of his neck. "Every time I needed help or needed to talk to somebody about pretty much anything, you'd just show up. Whether or not I asked in the first place. And, um….and I guess that I needed you to know that it's—" he gestured back and forth between them "—it's kinda a two way street type deal. So if you need me, I'm here." He folded his arms across his chest and readjusted the way he was leaning against the car, all of his movements jerky and vaguely uncomfortable-looking. "Soooooooo basically this is my long, rambling and completely un-eloquent way of saying that, uh, that you're kinda my best friend too." He let out a nervous laugh and glanced at her out of the corner or his eye. "Told you it was heavy."

Shock. Charlie was pretty sure that was what she was experience. Not that 'wow, that was a surprise' type of shock that you get over in the space of five seconds, but the type that incites an actual physiological reaction. It was like someone had hit pause on life so that her brain could have time to buffer and she could take in this information. Only apparently was the only one who had frozen because there was a hand waving in front of her face. "Earth to Charlie," Stiles called out, still sounding a bit skittish. "I'm, uh, I'm pretty sure this is the part where you say something."

Charlie blinked and shook her head a little to snap herself out of the trance she had gone into. It took her a few seconds, but she managed to get her thoughts in order. She shot Stiles her trademark cheeky grin and raised her eyebrows at him. "Sounds like we need to get one of those friendship necklaces that's divided into three pieces," she replied casually.

The eye-roll that followed was so pronounced Charlie was surprised the eyeballs didn't outright pop out of Stiles's head. "That's great, Charlie," he said huffily. "Thanks for that."

"Dude, you can have the middle part!" she insisted, clapping a hand on his shoulder. "I'll take the right side and Scott'll take the left, and when the necklace is assembled completely, it'll activate our superpowers so we can fight for truth and justice! Tell me you wouldn't watch that TV show."

"I would not watch that TV show," Stiles deadpanned.

"Liar."

"I would watch 'The Real Housewives of Scranton' before I watched that TV show."

"Oh, come on," she said, elbowing him in the side. "You're the creamy icing bit in a best friend Oreo. You know, my dad tried to freak me out when I was a kid by telling me it was cockroach guts."

Stiles let out a scoff and threw his hands in the air. "You are making absolutely no sense. And now you've ruined a delicious snack for me."

"Come off it, Stiles," she said, elbowing him in the ribs again. "We both know you're my best friend too."

Stiles's head snapped around so fast she was pretty sure he almost injured himself. "I am."

"Um, yeah?" Charlie replied like it was the most obvious thing in the world. Which for her it kind of was. Stiles on the other hand didn't seem quite so convinced. "Really?" he asked stupidly.

"Well there's Lydia, obviously," Charlie continued. "But yeah, Stiles. You're my best friend. I mean think about it." She started ticking off fingers on her hand. "You're the only person I can talk to about Star Wars—"

"That is true."

"—you're the only other person I know who's as sarcastic as I am, it's insanely easy to steal your food without you noticing—"

"Wait, what?"

"—and," Charlie continued, "you're always checking to see if I'm okay. No matter how much I hate it. And no matter how much crap I throw your direction for doing it." She bit her lip and shot him a small smile. And she honestly didn't know what that smile was supposed to mean. "You've been there for me too. So that two-way street thing? You don't have to worry about it."

"Huh. How about that." He stared off into the distance, a pensive look on his face, and when he finally did look back at her, it was with concern. "So, um, with regards to the whole me checking to see if you're okay, thing….Charlie, if I ask you a question, will you give me a straight answer?"

The question made Charlie freeze. They were back to that spot again, the one where she became all scary and defensive and tried to shove people away. Stiles was knocking at that door again, and she was terrified to open it. But she needed to keep Stiles in her life, as a friend at least. Which meant that she needed to give a little to. So she swallowed heavily and nodded. "Sure."

"I mean it," Stiles insisted. "None of that sarcasm or deflecting stuff. I can tell when you're deflecting—you can't deflect a deflector.

"Alright, sure," Charlie reiterated.

Stiles looked at her with earnest, concerned eyes. "Is there something wrong? I mean really wrong? And I'm not just talking about the stuff coming out of your nose. I mean lately you just…I don't know, you just seem a lot more distant. Plus sometimes when you think nobody's watching you, you get this look on your face where you look really tired. And I don't mean tired like sleepy, but you do look like that too…..I mean tired like you've seen a lot of stuff. Hard stuff, dark stuff."

"I have seen dark stuff," Charlie muttered, kicking at a bit of gravel under her feet. "We all have. We literally burned a wolf monster to death like three weeks ago."

"But not like that," Stiles said, shaking his head. "It's like….you know how sometimes when people get back from war and you can see it in their eyes? Like they've looked death in the face and saw to the other side? That's the kind of look I'm talking about. So I'm asking you—for real—is there something wrong?"

Charlie sucked in a deep breath and held it for a few moments. It was the moment of truth.

"Yes."

The look that crossed Stiles's face next wasn't one of surprise. Of course he wasn't surprised, he had known something was off for a while. The expression he was wearing was one of gratitude. "You know you can tell me, right?" he said, nudging her with his elbow.

Charlie nodded in understanding, but a dark pit formed in the base of her stomach. "What if I'm not ready to?" she admitted quietly.

"That's fine too," Stiles said, bobbing his head. "You've just….you've just got to know that you're not alone. I'm not gonna disappear on you like your mom."

At those words, both of them reacted immediately. Charlie's eyes snapped up to his, wide with shock, while he looked down at her, his eyes wide with horror. "Oh—oh my God!" he stammered out incoherently. "I am s—so sorry. I can't believe I just said that. That was so many lightyears away from being an okay thing to say. I didn't mean—I was just—"

"Right."

The word came out as a whisper. Charlie barely heard it herself so she wasn't surprised when Stiles did a double take. 'What?" he demanded, his eyebrows pulling together in confusion.

"I said you're right, Stiles. I deal with my shit myself because nobody's ever been around long enough to help. So I don't let them. I never have. I…..I am a little bit broken."

At that last sentence, a pained look crossed Stiles's face. A weird, whining noise came out of his throat and he slammed his head back into the metal of the Jeep behind him, giving rise to a large clang. The whine morphed seamlessly into a groan of pain as he rubbed at the back of his head. Stiles swore under his breath and let his eyes flicker in Charlie's direction. "Look, I'm sorry I pushed. You really don't need me forcing—"

"Yes, I do," she said, finally daring to look him in the eyes again. He exhaled sharply and his eyebrows drew together almost imperceptibly. He didn't get it. Hell, she wasn't even sure she got it and she was the one thinking it in the first place. Sighing heavily, she rolled along the side of the Jeep so she was leaning against her shoulder and facing him directly. "I need somebody to force me to not bottle all of it up." She bit down hard on her lip and kicked absently at a bit of gravel near her foot. "I need to talk about it. Otherwise nothing's ever going to change, is it?"

Stiles let out a snort that was either relieved or disbelieving—she wasn't sure which. "You sure."

"Yeah," she said, nodding earnestly. "Thanks for not letting me disappear into my own head. I can do that sometimes."

Stiles swallowed heavily and nodded as well. "O—of course. Always. You're my—my friend."

The two of them looked at each other for a long time. It was a look of mutual understanding. She might be a shitty communicator and he might be overly pushy and while they might argue and bicker, when it came down to it, they understood each other. That's why he was her best friend and she was his. She just wished there could be a little more to it. But if there wasn't, that was still okay. She could stay on the other side of that line if it meant he stayed in her life. He was in love with Lydia and he was her best friend. The one didn't rule out the other. But it also didn't eliminate that feeling of longing she felt.

Then, all of the sudden, something changed. The whole thing happened in a bit of a haze. It wasn't clear who had started or how it had come about. It was like some unseen magnetic force had pulled them together. All Charlie knew was that suddenly her lips were on his and his arms were around her waist, pulling her in close. Charlie's head was in a fog. She couldn't think about anything other than his hands, his lips, and the feeling of warmth that was building up inside her. She might not have been able to think straight, but she had this distinct feeling of clarity.

Charlie's hands rested on Stiles's chest as their lips moved together, but then they instinctively reached upwards, winding around his neck, arching into him, and holding onto him as if for dear life. One of his hands moved up from her waist, sliding up her back until it rested at the base of her neck, his thumb lightly brushing over the nape of her neck. The whole experience was a sensory overload. Nothing else existed outside of what she was feeling. She vaguely recognized that her back had hit something solid—she was pressed against the side of his Jeep—but that didn't matter. Nothing else mattered.

This kiss was nothing like the first one they had shared. That one had been sweet and to the point. This one…it was more all-consuming, borne of pain and vulnerability and maybe even a little bit of desperation. Their lips moved together eagerly, like each of them was searching for something in the other—some fundamental need for comfort or understanding. Charlie could feel herself beginning to become dizzy from the lack of oxygen. It was only when Stiles reached his hand up to cup her cheek that she even registered what was happening.

Charlie inhaled sharply, making Stiles move back slightly. His eyes were wide, like he was just as shocked by what had just happened as she was. They stood there—her pressed against the Jeep with her arms around his neck, him with one hand on her waist and the other on her cheek—for a long time, neither of them speaking. Her mind was racing as fast as her heart was beating, but she couldn't find anything to say or do. Stiles's mouth—the one that was just on hers—was hanging open, his lips moving like he was trying to speak, but the words were eluding him. They were both paralyzed.

All of the sudden, the sound of a ringtone started blaring out loudly, and they jumped apart with surprise. The spell of the previous moment had been broken, and they were back to being Charlie and Stiles, only with a lot more baggage between them. Not knowing what else to do, Stiles reached into the back pocket of his jeans and pulled out his cell phone. He looked between the screen and Charlie a few times, uncertain of what to do. "I—it's Scott," he stammered out, his eyebrows furrowing at Charlie like he was asking her a question.

Charlie swallowed heavily and nodded at him. "You—you should get that," she said, her voice shaky. "He was supposed to be at the ice rink. It's probably important."

Stiles continued to stare at her for a few moments, the phone ringing in his hand with an inscrutable expression on his face. It was on its last ring when he finally pressed the 'send' button and held it up to his ear. "Hey, buddy," he whispered into the phone. "I'm a bit busy here and—Wait, what?"

While Stiles was being filled in on what had happened at the ice rink, Charlie felt her heart beat faster and faster. She shouldn't have done that. They shouldn't have kissed. It was too confusing, it was too much hurt. That moment of weakness and vulnerability had led to something whose consequences she couldn't even come close to understanding. So Charlie took the opportunity to do what she did best. Run. She climbed into her car, turned on the engine and took off, and when she looked up in the rearview mirror, she saw Stiles standing there and watch her driving into the distance, the hand holding the phone hanging limp. And she was left with one, all-consuming thought.

She had just ruined everything.

**So on a scale of 1 to 10 how much do you guys hate me right now? It's gotta be like a 12, right? But you guys did want a kiss, so...here it is. Didn't end up exactly like you had planned did it? So I'm going to explain my reasoning for Charlie's and Stiles's reactions to this. Stiles knows he had to take things slow with Charlie, what with all her trust issues and stuff. That was why he just told her she was his best friend. Baby steps. Charlie...she's heard Stiles say he loved Lydia so many times that she shut that door and locked it because otherwise she would end up getting hurt. She's got some serious abandonment issues. While that kiss might have been genuine, it was SO the wrong time. Making them get together now would not be a realistic progression of their relationship in my opinion. Neither she nor Stiles intended for it to happen, it just...did. Charlie was having a seriously shitty day and now that kiss is just making her impossibly confused. So she bolted. It might not be the kindest thing to do, but she's scared. Terrified. And just to let you know, this is all setup. When they do actually get together it'll be impossibly perfect. The scene in my head is the perfect way for it to happen.**

**Oh my God, I'm the worst. WHY DO I TORTURE MY CHARACTERS LIKE THIS?! Especially Stiles. He so doesn't deserve all this. I hope this doesn't make Charlie too unsympathetic. She's a hot mess right now. She's a human with flaws. Some pretty huge ones. I hope you guys still like her after this. Take comfort in knowing that you don't have to wait TOO much longer.**

**Please don't hate me! And please review.**

**SOUNDTRACK FOR THIS CHAPTER.**

**Begin chapter. Charlie stresses about life in general and muses about Stiles's over-protectiveness.**

****-~-~-~-~-~-~-**All - Blackbird Blackbird  
><strong>

**Charlie runs to the bathroom and tries to cope with her hallucination of Peter.**

**-~-~-~-~-~-~-Devil Like Me - Rainbow Kitten Surprise**

**Charlie snaps at Stiles and goes to see Derek.**

**-~-~-~-~-~-~-Pressure - Until the Ribbon Breaks  
><strong>

**Charlie goes to Deaton's office as a last ditch effort.**

****-~-~-~-~-~-~-**Vicious Traditions - The Veils**

**Charlie leaves Deaton's clinic and goes to pick up Stiles + the most awkward car ride of all time.**

****-~-~-~-~-~-~-South - Racing Glaciers  
><strong>**

**Charlie and Stiles talk and kiss. Picture the kiss starting at the 2:21 mark.**

**-~-~-~-~-~-~-17 - Youth Lagoon**

**Charlie freaks out and drives off.**

**-~-~-~-~-~-~-Boys I Like - Desert Stars**


	13. Synonymous

**Disclaimer: 'Teen Wolf' isn't mine. Shocking, right? But it's true. If there are any similarities in content or dialogue, it has probably originated with the show.**

**A huge thank you to We're All M-M-Mad Here, Doieversleep, ParalyzedInHeaven, DarlingPeterPan, runawaycherry93, jinkiestrap, ShapedLikeStars, TheMMMG, Roxu, Daenerys86, Atomicity, Iwannabelikeme, she.s. .one, katiesgotagun, WhatsGoingOn, Tania, Micaela M, Guest 1, pennamethathasn'tbeentaken, SK-Scatenato, L. , Ava, Lil Miss Sunshine14, Mizuki-the-dead, meels234, .lover, Shes-The-Proto-Type, TWsos12345, Montanasmith5897, Gee Brittany, Damselindestress98, nessafly, 437, PhoenixRage92, KennedyRaye, Jaiime95, onethousandmoths, zvc56, 19irene96, cateslikescats, Hanna, Tinker, Just Anonymous, Noxen, Bookiee, Smiles in the Shadows, VeeWillRockYou, Guest2, Undeniable Weirdness, Ayine, Anon, ellsosaurus, Guest 3, swanqueen4, Female whovian, SimplyKelly, Guest 4, YelloSubmarine93, shy-lady, and Guest 5 for reviewing. You guys are the best!**

**So here's the Charlie reaction chapter. I hope you like it.**

Chapter 13 – Synonymous

Aka

Chapter 13 – Charlie vs. the Longest Night Ever

Stupid. Idiotic. Impulsive. Rash. Mindless. Self-destructive. Foolish. Stupid.

Wait. She had already used that last one. More than once actually. She had used that one particular word a lot of times. In fact, she had called herself that word about five thousand times in a row as she drove home, exceeding the speed limit by a not insubstantial amount the entire way. Hell, she had used the word so many times it seemed to lose all sense of meaning. It was just a mixed up jumble of syllables that blurred together in a pile of incoherent nonsense. Which was why she had started branching out in terms of adjectives with which she opted to describe herself.

Ridiculous. Touched in the head. Dense...shit, she was running out of adjectives to abuse herself with. She really needed to find a thesaurus. Like right now.

But no matter how many words she ran through, there was one that ended up sticking. Stupid. How else could she describe what had happened between her and Stiles? It had only taken a moment—the space of about half a second—and everything she had worked so hard to maintain had collapsed. Their friendship, their weird sort-of partnership in regards to all things supernatural, her own peace of mind—she had destroyed it all. And it had only taken a few seconds. Were things really that fragile? Was she really that fragile?

What the hell had happened? Charlie still couldn't totally figure it out—how that kiss had come to be—even though the whole thing was burned into her brain. They had shared a moment that changed everything and absolutely nothing all at once, and she couldn't help but try and pick it apart—analyze all of the elements and motivations and little aspects that might give her hints into motivations. But she shouldn't do that. She couldn't do that. It was just one of those things that happens when you're feeling vulnerable or alone. Stiles had still been in love with Lydia since the third grade. She and Stiles were friends. That's all there was to it.

Except that it wasn't. There was a time where that was all there was to it, but that time was over. Now that they kissed—an actual, real kiss—there was a...thing. Now she and Stiles had a—a thing. A thing neither of them could ignore or push to the side. The relationship between the two of them had been complicated before, at least from her perspective, but it had remained intact because of one inexorable reason. There was a line that they didn't cross. Well she had gone and crossed that line now. Hell, she had sprinted across it. And in doing so she had opened a huge can of worms.

Stupid. Stupid, stupid, stupid. That was definitely the best word to describe the situation. But despite trying as hard as she could, she couldn't help but latch onto a couple of other words as well. Incredible. Passionate. Earth-shattering. The list could have gone on for a lot longer, but it was easier not to dwell on it. Suffice to say that that kiss was like an oasis in the desert that was her life. For a little while, everything that was wrong and everything that had been troubling fell away. It was a single pure moment. And now it was over.

As she flew down the wooded road, Charlie heard her phone ringing in her bag in the back seat. She knew exactly which song would be blaring out those tiny speakers, but she forced herself not to hear it. Instead she reached for the volume controls on her radio and cranked up the music to the point where the muffled sound of her phone was completely obliterated. Charlie sucked in a deep breath, but the air inside the car felt stale and oppressive, so she lowered the windows as well. Wind ripped through the car, sending her hair flying about, stinging as it whipped in her face, but it was the good sort of pain. It was a rush, it was liberating—the same feeling she got when she went running. Maybe it was because she _was_ running, only this time she knew exactly what she was running from. Once she stopped, she'd be forced to face it again. And she knew she would hate herself for it.

Charlie managed to get back to herself way too soon. But that's what happens when you drive twenty miles over the speed limit, isn't it. She wasn't sure how long she sat in the car before daring to open the door, her hands gripping the steering wheel and silently trying to keep it all together. A little while ago she had come to the realization why she hadn't found a 'special place' in Beacon Hills. It was because now her 'place' was that car. She wasn't sure why, but inside that car she felt safe. It was probably ridiculous, but she kind of felt her dad there. All those hours they had worked on the thing, replacing rusted out panels and engine parts, pointing out how ridiculous the other one looked covered in motor oil. He was as much a part of that car as she was. Sometimes she could even swear she the car still kind of smelled like him.

What felt like hours later her phone started ringing again, destroying the complete silence she had cocooned herself in. Charlie jumped in her seat before clambering over the back seat to grab her bag. She grappled around in it until she found her cell phone and extracted it from her bag, allowing the notes of 'White and Nerdy' to ring free. Charlie's stomach began tying itself into knots as she stared down at the screen. She found herself looking at a picture of Stiles rolling his eyes at her heavily in the cafeteria that time she asked him to 'vogue' for the camera. At the bottom of the screen, she looked at those two options literally spelled out for her.

Answer.

Ignore.

She stared down at the phone, her eyes darting back and forth between those two options, wondering which one she should push. She could answer the phone and deal with the problem, or she could ignore it and hoped it all fixed itself. She should answer. She knew she should answer. But she was a coward. Soon enough the phone stopped ringing. The decision was made for her.

Swearing loudly, Charlie hit the power button on her phone, making it power down. She drove her hands into her hair and pulled at it. How could she have so royally screwed things up? For the first time since she had gotten in that car, Charlie willed herself to look at her reflection in the rearview mirror. She blinked in shock when she saw the mascara and eyeliner running down her face. She hadn't even realized that she had been crying in the first place. She wiped the black out from under her eyes and stared at her eyes for a long time, trying to see if even she could figure out what was going on behind them.

It took Charlie a while to admit that staying in the car didn't necessarily protect her from all the problems going on outside of it. Finally she made herself release that steering wheel and get out of the car. It was only as she trudged up the stairs that she realized there was something strange going on—that there was something that didn't quite fit. Charlie came to a complete stop on the second step up to the front door and looked around, analyzing the situation as best as she could despite the fact that her eyes were still itching.

She looked down at the time on her Avengers swatch watch. It read 7:03 p.m. That was way, was too early for Mel's car to be ensconced in the driveway, but it also wasn't the strangest thing she noticed. Parked across the street from her was a car—a truck—that was simultaneously strange and familiar, like she knew she had seen it before and couldn't quite place it.

Frowning to herself Charlie turned back to the house, taking note of the lights flickering through the drapes leading into the living room as she continued up to the house. She wasn't sure why, but she was especially quiet as she slipped through the door. After closing it gently behind her, she moved in the direction of the living room. There was a voice emanating from the room that sounded vaguely like...Zooey Deschanel?

After that it was kind of like one of those scenes in a horror movie, where the character tiptoes towards a room. They know they're not going to find anything pleasant and that their investigation of said oddity would likely lead to their doom, but they just can't not know what's on the other side of that door. Charlie approached the living room with trepidation, turning the handle slowly before gently pushing the door open. Her eyes felt like they were going to bug out of her head when she saw what was inside.

Mel and Finstock. Mel and _Finstock_. The two of them were sitting there on the couch covered in a blanket with a bowl of popcorn between the two of them. And they were cuddling. _Cuddling_.

Honestly, Charlie had been just fine with the whole 'my aunt is dating my teacher thing' when it was brought up the first time around. Was it ideal? No. Could she deal with it? Yes. Or at least she thought she could. Then it had been an abstract question. Now she was being smacked in the face by the reality of the situation. Her _aunt_ was dating _Coach Finstock_. On a regular day she might have been prepared to deal with something like this, but right now it was just a little bit too much. So instead of doing the normal human thing of shuffling away and hiding in her room and freaking out to Lydia about it over the phone, she stood there in the doorway, gaping.

Her aunt and Coach Finstock were watching '500 Days of Summer', with his arm draped over her shoulders.

The messenger bag slipped from her shoulder and hit the floor with a loud thump, making her aunt jump. The woman projected herself a good foot and a half off the chair and looked up at Charlie with wide, surprised eyes, generally exhibiting the countenance of somebody who had just been caught. The bowl of popcorn went flying across the room, sending fluffy white kernels flying everywhere. "Charlie!" she exclaimed in a overly cheerful voice. "Welcome home! Wh—what are you doing here? I thought you were studying with Lydia tonight. The two of you usually eat dinner together after you study."

Charlie opened and closed her mouth a few times, searching for the right words. But she couldn't find any. Not a single one. So instead she blurted out the first thing that came into her head. "You're watching '500 Days of Summer'," she said stupidly.

Mel looked back and forth between Charlie and Finstock, not sure how to proceed. "Um, yes," she said. "Yes, we are."

"Yeah, I don't really get it," Finstock drawled out, remaining intentionally oblivious to the sheer awkward tension that was building up in the room. "This is supposed to be a chick flick, right?" he demanded, waving at the screen. "I thought they were supposed to end up together and happy at the end of chick flicks. You know, the Dear Johns and that one with the notebook. That's why they all have the same poster."

"You mean the Nicholas Sparks movie posters that all look the same?" Charlie suggested, still a little bit in shock.

Finstock snapped his fingers and nodded at her knowingly. "Exactly! You know that shot where the guy and the girl are about to kiss but don't? This one—" he jerked his head in the direction of the screen "—this one's about the girl with the Sailor Moon eyes making Hallmark guy spiral into depression. Not sure I see how it's romantic. Also, what's with the cartoon birds?"

Charlie stared at the Finstock for a few more moments, eyes narrowed. "It's a school night," she pointed out, eyeing Finstock suspiciously. "Should you really be out this late? You've got an early morning tomorrow."

"Okay!" Mel practically shouted. She stood up suddenly, causing the blanket and the pile of popcorn to fly to the floor. "So why don't I go heat up some of that lasagna Charlie made yesterday? Or—or takeout. We could have...a 'get to know you' sort of dinner! A dinner where, you know, we get to know each other? Does that sound good?" She looked between Charlie and Finstock. Neither of them objected entirely, but neither of them were particularly excited either. "Fantastic!" Mel shouted with a special sort of enthusiasm. "I'm going to call for takeout!"

And with that Mel sprinted out of the room, leaving Charlie and Finstock on their own, staring at each other. It was almost like a standoff. She could swear she was hearing that classic Western music right now. "Are you going to be my new daddy?" Charlie asked, folding her arms across her chest.

Coach Finstock stared back at her for a few moments. "I am incredibly uncomfortable right now."

"Well it looks like we've got at least one thing in common."

The two of them continued to stare at each other blankly. It was almost comedic, the way they staid still and speechless while Mel ran around in the background, trying to make sure everybody was okay and talking to herself as she did so. The sentence 'I can salvage this' was uttered more than once. The next few minutes were either in slow-motion or super-speed. Charlie honestly couldn't say. All she could say was that she suddenly found herself sitting at the dinner table with a complete table setting including the salad fork. Who the hell actually used the salad fork, anyway?

When the doorbell finally rang for the takeout, Mel sprinted for the door and wrenched it open. The guy at the door seemed more than a little bit flustered to see Mel's manic face. He became even more flustered when Charlie leaned far back enough in her chair far enough to come into his frame of vision and mouthed the words 'take me with you'. "Alright!" Mel exclaimed as she ran back to the dinner table with bags full of Chinese food. "Who's ready to eat?"

There were only three of them sitting around the table, but somehow the woman had managed to order enough food to feed the entire freaking lacrosse team. "Here you go, Charlie," she said, spooning out some of the food onto Charlie's plate. "Cashew chicken. Your favorite."

Charlie could have pointed out that cashew chicken was not, in fact, her favorite, but she kept her mouth clamped shut. Mel wasn't exactly used to it when situations didn't go according to plan, and this one was definitely diverging heavily from the 'casual night in' she had mapped out with her new boyfriend. So she let Mel do her thing, which right now meant running around like a chicken with her head cut off and trying to take care of everybody. But eventually it came time for her to sit down and stay still, and she realized things were just as uncomfortable as they had been when she started running around in the first place.

At first the only sounds in the room were those of people eating—the clink of the fork against plates, the slight smacking of lips, the occasional sip from a water glass. Charlie was highly aware of the fact that her jaw kept clicking every time she chewed, and given the lack of conversation she was pretty sure everybody else was aware of it too.

"So, Charlie," Mel said brightly, breaking the silence. "How was school today?"

Charlie stopped mid-chew and her eyes flickered to Finstock for a moment. In that moment Mel realized what exactly she had asked and her eyes fell shut. Charlie could see the woman mentally kicking herself. But Charlie decided to answer anyway. She swallowed down her food and took a big gulp of water before speaking. "It, uh, it was fine," she said evasively. "You know, your typical day. Pop quiz in French. Mr. Adams played 'The Patriot' in American History instead of actually teaching us anything. I'm pretty sure he was hung over."

Charlie froze for a moment, afraid of how Finstock might feel about her opinions about his colleagues. But all fears of him being offended were wiped away when she heard that booming laugh. "Oh, he was definitely hung over," Finstock chuckled. "You know how he's got all those water bottles around? Well he never seems to be at the water cooler." He waved his fork between Charlie and Mel. "Do the math."

"Right," Charlie drawled out, shooting him a weird look. "Anyways chemistry class was chemistry class and econ..." She turned to Finstock. "Well I guess I could ask you about that one."

"So when's your next lacrosse game!" Mel interjected, desperate to steer the conversation away from the topic at hand.

Finstock swallowed his exceptionally large mouthful of rice before speaking. "Our next game is tomorrow. It's gonna be a tough one. Game of the season."

"Well maybe I should come," Mel suggested with a small smile. "I could cheer you on."

"That would be a nice change of pace," Finstock said, bobbing his head. "They cheer for the players, but they always forget about the coach. It's a travesty, really."

"Well not this time," Mel said, her voice getting oddly coy.

If Charlie could have picked out a single moment to up and die—no prelude, no pain, just a sudden, quick death—it would probably be that moment right there. Forget werewolves, forget everything that had just happened with her and Stiles, watching her aunt flirt with Finstock was what was going to push her over the edge and send her tumbling into insanity.

"Yup," she sighed, pushing some food around her plate. "And I'll have a bucket of Gatorade on standby."

"No Gatorade," Finstock said suddenly, holding a hand in the air as if to stop her. "Never Gatorade. That is a terrible tradition. I mean sure the sentiment is nice and everything, but do you know what happens when somebody dumps Gatorade on you?"

His eyes darted back and forth between Mel and Charlie seriously, demanding some sort of response. Charlie and Mel exchanged a glance before Charlie spoke. "What happens?"

"You're covered in freaking Gatorade!" the Coach exclaimed. "That's what happens. Do you have any idea how sticky that stuff is? Incredibly sticky. And I'll tell you one thing, it gets everywhere. Like places you didn't know existed in the first place. It is..." he shivered a little bit "...it is profoundly disgusting."

Charlie wrinkled her nose slightly at the word picture being painted for her. Mel on the other hand seemed to be holding back a fit of laughter. For some completely inexplicable reason, she found Finstock's antics not only tolerable, but endearing. The whole thing just didn't make any sense. There could not be two more opposite people on the entire planet, but here she was, laughing and having a good time.

"And another thing," Finstock barreled on. "Nobody ever thinks about the drive home. So there you are, you've won the big game, and you get to drive home covered in blood, sweat, tears, and Glacier Freeze."

"That's not even a good flavor," Charlie muttered under her breath.

"Exactly," Finstock half-shouted, seizing onto her words. "It totally destroyed the interior of my car." He tapped a finger against the side of his head dramatically. "Nobody thinks about the details."

"So Charlie's got some friends on the lacrosse team," Mel said, eager to maintain the conversational momentum. "Scott McCall and Stiles Stilinski."

At the mention of Stiles's name, Charlie twitched slightly. As bad at the dinner was, the situation had had one benefit. It kept her from thinking about everything else. Now she didn't even have Finstock's slightly crazed ramblings to keep her from thinking about him.

"McCall," Finstock said, nodding his head. "Now there is a great player. Not sure where the hell he came from. Last year he was manning the bench with Stilinski, but he must have been eating his wheaties over the summer because this year he came back ready to play."

"And what about Stiles," Mel continued.

A weird, squeaking noise emanated from Finstock's mouth and he scrunched up his face into a strangely pained expression. "Well you've got to appreciate the kid's enthusiasm," he said with a weird sort of laugh. "But lacrosse requires, uh, a particular skill set. Running...aim...that sort of stuff. He's probably not going to see the field this year. Not unless Greenburg masterminds another pinkeye epidemic. Freaking Greenburg."

"Maybe Stiles just hasn't gotten a chance to show what he can do," Charlie muttered defensively.

Finstock looked at her and nodded his head slowly. "Could be," he said carefully. "Could be."

After that, Charlie couldn't really say where the conversation went. Her mind was somewhere else entirely. She was tuning in and out for the most part, which was probably a shame. Finstock was regaling Mel with a bunch of crazy stories, and while she didn't hear most of it she definitely caught the words 'sombrero', 'goat', and 'customs agent'. Under normal circumstances she might have actually had a good time, but today it was just too much. She turned into the stereotype of a teenager, maintaining a broody, silent exterior and pushing food around her plate.

Eventually Finstock made his exit. As he was leaving Charlie said a quick goodbye and immediately began clearing the table. Mel and Finstock had been dating for almost a week now. They had probably gotten to the end of the night kiss stage, and that was something Charlie didn't want seared into her brain. Instead she opted to stay out of the way and in the kitchen, wiping the plates clean. After a few minutes, Charlie heard the sound of heels clacking against hardwood floors and Mel appeared in the doorway, a slightly disappointed expression on her face.

"Charlie, what was that?" she asked, her delicate eyebrows pulling together in a frown. "I didn't think it was physically possible for you to be that quiet."

Charlie's stomach twisted with guilt as she stood at the sink. "I talked a bit," she murmured, squirting some more soap on the plates.

"Yes, you talked a bit," Mel confirmed. "But you didn't _try _at all. You didn't speak unless someone addressed you directly. You didn't contribute. I—I didn't expect the evening to go this way either, okay? It was abrupt and it was awkward and it's not at all how I wanted this...reintroduction to go, but I was hoping you might make it a little easier. On all of us. I thought you said you were okay with this."

Charlie put the plates down and planted her hands on either side of the sink, letting her head sag forwards on her shoulders. From anyone else this would seem like a mild scolding, but from Mel—a woman who hated confrontation more than anyone else Charlie had ever met—it felt like she was being screamed at. Not because Mel was especially angry or harsh, but because Charlie was kicking herself for letting the woman down yet again. "I'm sorry," she murmured. She turned around to face the woman, leaning against the counter with her arms folded across her chest, but didn't look her directly in the eye. "I really am sorry. And I am okay with it. Seriously. I just..." She let out sigh and lifted her eyes to look directly at her aunt. "I just had a really, really long day. I wasn't expecting it and I choked."

Mel blinked with surprise and her eyebrows furrowed even more. She was studying Charlie with a special sort of intensity, trying to figure out what was wrong. Immediately Charlie spun back around and began washing the dishes with renewed interest. It was a last ditch effort—she didn't think it would work. She was right. Mel appeared at her shoulder and took the dish she was scrubbing out of Charlie's hand, setting it down on the counter next to her. "What happened?" she asked gently.

"It was nothing," Charlie said, shaking her head.

"It was not nothing," Mel shot back in an almost harsh tone. "If it puts that expression on your face it was not nothing." Charlie sucked in a breath and made a move to pick up another plate, but Mel's hand darted out, grasping hers and keeping her from the task. She leveled her with that look only she could give—the one of total sympathy and understanding. That look would make Vladimir Putin fold like cheap suit.

"Charlie, I love you," Mel said gently. "I'm here to help you, but I can't help you if you don't tell me what's wrong. Just...just let me help you."

Charlie's jaw twitched and she stared down at the sink, looking at that drain and wishing she could crawl into it and disappear into the pipes. She could totally become a mole person and live in the sewers. And then a small hand grasped her shoulder. "No man is an island, Charlie," Mel continued. "It's okay to ask for help sometimes."

Of course Mel didn't know it, but those words made her stomach twist even more. Stiles had said the exact same thing to her just a few hours ago. And he was right. And Mel was right. She couldn't keep it bottled up anymore, not everything at least. She blew out a long breath and began to bounce up and down on the balls of her feet. "Hypothetically speaking," she began, her voice coming out as barely more than a whisper. "Hypothetically speaking, why would one person kiss another person, when that first person has feelings for the second person's best friend?"

Mel paused for a moment, her eyes darting back and forth like she was reading a book as she tried to decipher what exactly Charlie had just said. "There are lots of reasons to kiss somebody," Mel said after a few moments of contemplation. "Sometimes it doesn't have anything to with actual feelings. It can happen when you're feeling vulnerable or alone. Sometimes...sometimes things just happen. It's just a moment in time and it doesn't have to make sense."

Charlie bit her lip and nodded in understanding. "Yeah. Yeah that's what I thought."

Mel turned around and leaned against the counter as well so that she was standing shoulder-to-shoulder with her niece. "Charlie," she said softly, "I wasn't a teenager that long ago. I might have never been as clever as you or your father, but I am smart enough to know that all of the 'hypothetical scenarios' are never hypothetical."

"No," Charlie murmured. "No they aren't."

Mel's hand found its way to Charlie's back, rubbing small comforting circles. "So you kissed Scott?"

The minute the sentence left Mel's lips, Charlie's face contorted into an expression of surprise and perturbation. "Scott?!" she demanded, her voice coming out as a spluttering cough. "You think I kissed Scott?!"

"Or did Scott kiss you?" Mel asked in confusion. "It could really work both ways."

"What do you mean it could work both ways?!"

"You said somebody kissed somebody when they liked their best friend," Mel replied. "You could've kissed Scott when you liked Stiles. Or—or Scott could have kissed you when he liked Allison. They broke up, right?" She looked at Charlie with a completely baffled expression. "Wh—which is it? It's one of those isn't it?"

"Wha—no!" Charlie protested, shaking her head. Just the thought of it made her feel like she needed to brush her teeth. "No! It's neither of those. Sco—ew! No. Never. Kissing him would be like kissing my gay cousin, but more awkward! No! And I am just now realizing how weirdly incestuous our group is!" But through all the protests, Charlie almost didn't catch one thing Mel said. And once her brain had processed it, she felt like she had been kicked in the gut. "Y—you think I like Stiles?"

The look that crossed Mel's face after that was a special sort of sympathetic. "Honey," she said, shaking her head at Charlie. "I've known you liked that boy for months."

"How can you have known for months?!" Charlie spluttered, pointing to herself. "I only found out a few weeks ago!"

Mel's arm snaked around Charlie's shoulders, pulling her in close. "He was the only boy you really talked about," she said simply. "And you talked about him a lot. Plus whenever you mentioned him there was this tiny hint of a smile on your face. Even when you're rolling your eyes about something stupid he did."

Charlie's jaw hung open, staring at her aunt with complete incredulity. "And you didn't think you should bother telling me?"

"It's not the type of thing you can just tell somebody," Mel replied. "You have to figure that sort of stuff out on your own. It's part of growing up." Charlie's shoulders sagged and Mel pulled her in even closer, studying the side of the girl's face. "It was Stiles then, wasn't it? You and Stiles kissed?"

Charlie didn't respond, but then again her lack of response was confirmation enough. Mel blew out a long breath and began to rub Charlie's back again. "And he still has feelings for Lydia? You're sure?"

"I screwed it all up, Mel," Charlie whispered, shaking her head. "It was fine. I was dealing with it and then I just—I—"

At first Charlie had thought that she would get some sort of release from talking about it—from saying the words out loud. Like somehow forcing the words out of herself would force the pain out as well, sort of like sucking the venom out from a snake bite. But it didn't work. It was still as painful as before, only now it was out there, words drifting around in the universe. Useless, useless words. In that moment, Charlie must have looked really pathetic because Mel shot her a sad smile and petted her hair, shushing her gently. "We're going to need some ice cream, aren't we?"

"Yup," Charlie sighed, nodding to herself. "A lot of ice cream."

Leaning forwards, Mel pressed a soft kiss against Charlie's temples. "I'll get the spoons. We'll eat ourselves into a diabetic coma and we won't have to deal with any of our boy problems. How does that sound?"

Charlie exhaled sharply in something almost resembling a laugh. "That sounds fantastic."

Mel pressed one more kiss to Charlie's temple before releasing her and heading to the freezer. "Chocolate chip cookie dough or rocky road?"

Letting out a tiny scoff, Charlie rolled her eyes at her aunt. "Is that even a question?"

"Right," Mel said with a definitive nod. "Chocolate chip cookie dough it is. Go get changed into your pajamas. This is an endeavor that requires elastic waistbands."

The next twenty minutes or so were spent with Mel regaling Charlie with all the romantic misadventures of her youth, the first loves and the breakups. Apparently the first guy she ever really fell for was named Kevin and played in a garage band, complete with the flannel and long, stringy hair. They were not very good. And then there was Don, the used car salesman and Steven the weatherman and the biggest heartbreak of all, her college boyfriend Ethan. All of them had spelled pain at some point in Mel's life, but now the two of them were laughing hysterically at some of the truly stupid and ridiculous things said and done. That was the difference between pain and a funny story. Time. But then again maybe Mel was skipping over the bad parts and painting a pretty picture to make her feel better.

Maybe it was the ice cream and maybe it was finally being able to get at least one of the mountain of secrets she was dealing with off her chest, but Charlie finally reached some degree of peace. She wasn't okay—not by any stretch of the imagination—but she wasn't a complete blubbering mess. And that had to count for something, right?

In keeping with her general reaction to excessive amounts of sugar, Mel pretty much passed out after their conversation. Whenever you got more than the equivalent of a Snickers bar in her, she got very talkative for about fifteen minutes and then shut down like a laptop running low on battery. Flying in the face of the numerous protests thrown at her, Charlie eventually managed to get the woman into bed and tucked her in, ignoring as she petulantly muttered, 'that's my job'. By the time she made it up to her room it was almost 10:00 p.m., and she was finally ready to face the music.

Hopping onto her bed, Charlie drew her knees to her chest and stared down at the phone in her hand. Overall the thing looked innocuous with that blank screen, but all she had to do was press the button and she'd be opening the door onto all the things she had been trying to avoid for the second time that evening. Charlie pressed her lips together in a small 'o' and blew out a long breath before hitting the power button. Her stomach began twisting itself into knots as the thing began to boot up at a painfully slow rate. Finally it turned on and, as she suspected, the phone chimed loudly to let her know she had five new voicemails.

"Okay," Charlie whispered, nodding to herself. "Okay. Okay, you can do this."

Her hand tightened around the phone, but she steeled her nerves and dialed her voicemail before pressing her phone to her ear. She gnawed nervously on her fingernails as she listened.

"_You have five new messages."_

BEEP.

"_Hey. So...so that just happened. I didn't mean for...I mean you and me—we...We should probably talk about it. Call me back. Please. This is Stiles._

BEEP.

"_Hey. It's Stiles. H—you know what, you're totally in the right with the whole not talking on the phone while driving thing. Safety first and all that. I tooooooootally get it. And it reflects an independence from technology which for our generation is quite frankly inspiring. But, you know, when you get to a stopping point, call me back. This is Stiles. Yup. Bye._"

BEEP.

"_So, uh, so you haven't called me back yet. I'm going to have to go ahead and assume that you were kidnapped by Somali pirates or are currently being probed by aliens or, you know, the Bermuda triangle temporarily relocated to Beacon Hills and you're in the middle of it and no cell phone-affiliated waves are able to reach you at this—this particular moment in time. Anyways, call me back or I'll have to assume you've gone missing and get my dad to issue and APB. It's Stiles, by the way."_

BEEP.

"_So I just remembered that a person can only be counted as technically 'missing' when they've disappeared for over 24 hours so you don't have to worry about my dad sending out the bloodhounds to come track you down or anything like that. I'll—I'll see you at school tomorrow. We should talk in person. In person is better. It's Stiles again. Yeah."_

At first Charlie thought that was all there was to it. It was the logical conclusion to that series of messages. She was just about to hang up and spiral into another whirlpool of despair and self-pity when there was yet one more beep.

"_Hey_," Stiles's voice said hesitantly. "_So I know I said that thing about not talking till tomorrow and face-to-face and all that, but this time I'm not calling about the...the thing. Really, I'm not. I'm calling because freaking Erica did NOT respect the wheels and murdered my Jeep. And now I'm at the mechanics and the dude is totally trying to scam me out of a ton of cash so if you could tell me what a—a 'limited slip differential' is, that would be fantastic. Until then I'll be back in the office, seething with impotent rage."_

There was the sound a few footsteps followed by a disgusted groan. _"Ugh,"_ he muttered under his breath. "_Nice. That's real sanitary. There's crap all over this door handle. Quality establishment you're running here!" _After a little more muttering, he continued to speak into the receiver. _"Ugh. Figures. The guy was on the lacrosse team. And I know what you're thinking—'Stiles you're on the lacrosse team too and blah, blah, blah.' But you should see this picture. It's like Jackson has an even more egotistical older brother. Plus, who the hell keeps a high school lacrosse photo at work? I mean really—get over it already!" _Then there was a short pause and a heavy sigh. _"And now I'm rambling into your voicemail and—"_

Then, all of the sudden, he stopped talking. Charlie's hand instinctively tightened around the phone and she sat up a little straighter. Stiles didn't stop talking for no reason. Stiles _never_ stopped talking for no reason.

"_I—I can't move my fingers_," he whispered, his voice thick with fear. "_Why can't I—Oh my God. What is that? Holy crap, it's—"_

A clattering sound reached Charlie's ears, and it could only mean one thing. He had dropped the phone. She immediately threw herself to her feet and clapped her hand over the ear not pressed to the phone so she could hear what was going on. "Stiles!" she shouted, like he could hear her. But of course he couldn't hear her. The call had already happened—there was nothing she could do. Not one thing. And she had never felt more helpless. All she could do was listen.

After that, Stiles's voice was really far away. "_Oh. Hey. Hey! HEY! WATCH OUT!_"

All that came next was a loud thump and the sound of panicked breathing before the line went dead. Charlie's eyes ached and her vision began swim as her eyes began to fill with tears. If anything happened to Stiles it was on her. She should have kept her phone on. She should have answered it. She could have helped him, but she was too much of a freaking coward to answer the damn phone. It was on her. If anything happened to Stiles, it was on her. If he got hurt—if he—

Charlie didn't take any time to think. She didn't need to—there was nothing to think about in the first place. She collapsed on her hands and knees, grabbed the first pair of shoes she could find and darted out of her room, barely even remembering the keys to her car before she ran out the front door. Her hands were shaking as she tried to shove the key into the ignition of her car, but eventually she managed and it roared to life.

"Please be okay. Please be okay. You have to be okay."

The words came out of her mouth over and over again. But no matter how many times she said it, it didn't make it true. But she kept saying it. Because saying it didn't mean it wasn't true either. Charlie didn't really believe in praying. It seemed a little too much like wishing to her, and wishing was pointless. But in those few minutes she prayed to anything and anybody who might be listening.

A full hour had passed between that moment and Stiles leaving that voicemail. Anything could have happened. Charlie tried to keep herself as calm as possible, but her grip on the steering wheel made the movements of the car jerky and uncoordinated. The streets were deserted, but that only served to heighten Charlie's anxiety. There was no shortage of curves and turns leading through the impossible amount of forest in that town, and Charlie expected to find devastation around every corner. It got to the point that she was desperate to see anything that might tell her what had happened, but then she saw the flashing of red and blue lights. That didn't give her any peace of mind at all.

The car was still moving at an unreasonable speed as Charlie approached the garage. She slammed on the brakes as she approached, giving rise to a loud screech and the smell of burning rubber. After yet another truly shitty parking job, Charlie threw herself out of the car and ran towards the crime season. She ended up elbowing more than a few people to get to the front of the crowd forming around the caution scene tape.

Charlie could count half a dozen cop cars crowded in around the garage. The lights flashing in her eyes began to bleed together, washing out her vision. But then she saw it. The gurney with the black bag zipped all the way up to the top. Suddenly it wasn't the lights that were blinding her any more. It was panic.

Without thinking, Charlie lifted that flimsy bit of yellow tape and ducked under it. Her eyes darted back and forth quickly, trying to take in all the details of her surroundings. Her brain processed the information as quickly as possible, and it was all done she was left feeling cold and alone. She couldn't see Stiles. She couldn't see the sheriff. All she could see was an empty Jeep and a full body bag. Until someone else stepped into view, blocking her line of vision.

"What the hell do you think you're doing?" a voice demanded. A voice that managed to simultaneously bored, angry and bitter. She didn't even have to look up at that sneering face to know who it was.

"Get out of the way, Sean," Charlie growled, trying to step around him. But Deputy Sean dodged back in front of her.

"You know, it continuously surprises me that you can form coherent sentences," he shot back. "I mean, apparently you can't read." He pointed back at the line of people surrounding the crime scene. "You see that bright yellow tape back there? It has 'DO NOT CROSS' written in big bold letters."

Under normal circumstances Charlie would have some witty and cutting reply to throw at him, probably making a pop culture reference to some incompetent policeman. But today her mind was otherwise occupied. "Who is that?" she demanded, pointing in the direction of the gurney. "Who's in that bag."

Deputy Sean sighed heavily and shrugged his shoulders in a 'sorry-not-sorry' sort of way. "We're not supposed to divulge details to the public. Just because you ducked under that tape and you're besties with the boss's son doesn't mean you're no longer 'the public'."

Charlie bit down on her lip and folded her arms across her chest, bouncing up and down on the balls of her feet. She pretty much stopped breathing with the panic. "I—I need you to tell me what happened here," she whispered, looking up at Deputy Sean with a type of sincerity he obviously didn't expect from her. She must have looked pretty pathetic, because his eyebrows drew together expressing an emotion that almost demonstrated concern. He opened his mouth to say something. Whether it was another snarky putdown or a genuine human emotion clawing its way out of him the world would never know, because another even more familiar reached her ears.

"Okay, so now that's four times."

Charlie's head snapped to the direction of the voice and she finally released the breath she had been holding pretty much since she had heard the voicemail in the first place. It was Sheriff Stilinski. If Sheriff Stilinski was here, then Stiles was okay. He had to be. She let out a laughing breath, her body sagging with relief.

"Seriously," the sheriff said sidling up next to her. "I'm beginning to think that my son somehow managed to smuggle you a police scanner."

"Is Stiles okay?" Charlie asked, not allowing for any other commentary.

The sheriff wrinkled his nose in confusion. "What?"

"Is Stiles okay?" she reiterated.

"Y—yeah," he said stopping short and giving her a funny look. "Yeah, he's fine."

Charlie almost felt like she could collapse with relief. She staggered a few feet back and covered her hands with her face, letting out an almost manic-sounding laugh. She swallowed heavily and nodded before speaking. "Good. That's good."

The sheriff shifted on his feet and planted his hands on his hips, looking at her curiously. "Charlie, not that it isn't lovely to see you, but why are you here?"

"Because I really couldn't see much from back there," she said, jerking her thumb in the direction of the police tape behind her.

"Cute," the sheriff said with at light roll of the eyes. "I mean why are you here at this crime scene? It's a question I've gotten fairly used to asking recently."

"To annoy the hell out of me," Sean suggested seriously.

At that point both Charlie and Sheriff Stilinksi's heads slowly turned in Deputy Sean's direction, both of them shooting him a humorless look. Sean actually flinched at the reaction. "I'll just—" he pointed at the crowd "—I'll just take some statements, shall I? Okay."

Sean made a face and peeled away from the two of them, heading towards the crowd. Sheriff Stilinski rolled his eyes slightly at the guy before turning back to Charlie. "Alright," he said in a reasonable tone. "I think I'm entitled to an explanation as to why you've crashed yet another crime scene. Is your brain tied into some sort of crime radar?"

Charlie blew out a long breath and ran her hands through her hair before speaking. "Stiles—he left me a voicemail message," she began hesitantly. "He was asking car question—thought the mechanic was trying to scam him out of money. Then he—he kind of freaked out and dropped the phone and then the line went dead. I—I thought that maybe something had happened to him and—"

"And?" the sheriff prompted, raising his eyebrows at her. "You drove straight here?"

A sheepish wince covered Charlie's face. "Uh, yup." That caused the sheriff's eyebrows raise even higher, making Charlie shift uncomfortably on her feet. She scratched at the back of her neck and looked around to see if Stiles was hiding anywhere around there. A war was going on inside her head. On one hand she desperately needed to actually physically see him—visual confirmation that he was, in fact, okay. The other part of her just wasn't ready to cope with that yet. It was all just too soon.

"Stiles isn't here," the sheriff said, answering the question that must have been written all over her face. "I sent him home with a deputy about fifteen minutes ago when we finished taking his statement."

"Oh," Charlie replied. The word came out as a sigh of both relief and disappointment.

Then the sheriff eyed her curiously, like he was trying to gauge something about her reaction. "I'll tell him you stopped by," he said, nodding at her.

Charlie swallowed heavily and nodded back. "Y—yeah. Sure. I mean if you think you should."

"I'm sure he'd appreciate it," Sheriff Stilinski said, looking at her pointedly.

"Okay," Charlie replied, continuing to nod, unsure of what else to do. "And you can tell him that a limited slip differential controls the power being delivered to each of the wheels. When one wheel loses traction it compensates with the other so the car can continue on the designated path without deviation."

The sheriff narrowed his eyes at her with a perplexed expression. "I have no idea what any of that means.

"It means the mechanic guy was trying to scam him," she said with a shrug. The sheriff's eyes instinctively flicked in the direction of the body bag, and Charlie felt her stomach clench in shame. It was only then that she realized the mechanic guy as probably in that body bag. "Or you could skip that bit. You totally can ignore that entirely. And then you can forget I said it. Or that I said anything. Ever."

Maybe it was something in her slightly manic behavior, but the sheriff narrowed his eyes at her, like he was measuring her up. "You should go home," he said gently. "It's late—you should get some sleep."

Charlie was getting awfully tired of people telling her that, but she was also just plain tired. "Okay," she agreed. "You're right. I should just go and, you know, stop impeding the investigation."

The sheriff clapped a hand on her shoulder and looked at her, pressing his lips together in a thin, wan smile. "I'll see you at the next one then," he murmured.

Charlie let out a snort and narrowed her eyes at him. "Are you inviting me to a crime scene?"

"No," he replied, a tiny smirk pulling at the corner of his lips. "But you know what they say. We have to accept the things we can not change."

Charlie let out a snort and scratched at her forehead. "Wise advice for us all, sir."

"Get the hell out of here."

"Absolutely."

As Charlie walked away from the crime scene and ducked back under that tape, she felt a wave of relief crash into her. Stiles was okay. Stiles was fine. But, as per usual, anything good that happened was paired with something equally bad or worse.

Charlie couldn't say for sure what happened to Stiles during that voicemail, but she could do her best to piece it together. That mechanic's death hadn't just been some giant, unfortunate accident. Something had done it to him—something Stiles didn't quite recognize, something that could paralyze him. It was something new. Which meant that it was that lizard monster thing that had attacked Allison and Scott the day of the full moon. It wasn't just a weird story anymore—it was real and it was killing people. And it didn't need the full moon to do all those things.

Whatever attacked Allison and Scott, whatever had paralyzed Stiles, whatever they were facing now, it played by a whole new set of rules. And as far as she was concerned, new was not good. In fact new was very, very bad. She didn't know anything about 'new'—she couldn't fight 'new'. Not yet anyway.

By the time Charlie got back to her house, it was just a little after 11:00 pm. Mel was still out like a light, courtesy of excess ice cream, so it wasn't that difficult to sneak back it. She didn't even need to bother with the 'sneaking' part. She walked straight in, yanked off her shoes, and tossed them aside before continuing up to her room. As she stood there, she looked around at the dark and shadows filling the room like there was something she should be afraid of lurking there. But it was quiet. Totally quiet.

Charlie picked up her messenger bag up off the floor of her bedroom and dug around inside until her fingers found their way around that small glass bottle Deaton had given her earlier that day—the one he said would help her sleep. And she should sleep. She should close her eyes and drift off like the sheriff had suggested. She really should. Sleep was good, sleep was something she desperately needed. But there was one thing she needed more than that. Answers. So she took the bottle and put it on her shelf, unused.

There was somebody she needed to talk to. And he was a giant pain in her ass.

**Okay, so things are going to start escalating even more now! I know there was not much Stiles in this chapter, but honestly she needed time to recuperate and think. Not that she got much of it. **

**Things to tease for the next chapter: Peter, banter with Lydia, serious talks with Allison, and awkwardness with Stiles! In person this time, I swear.**

**SOUNDTRACK! More songs for you guys. I like them and hope you do to. Check out my spotify account for the 'Blood in the Water' Soundtrack and more! The link is on my profile.**

**Charlie drives home, experiencing more than a little emotional trauma.**

**-~-~-~-~-~-~Divided by Zero – Ramona Falls**

**Charlie finds Mel and Finstock and is quite perturbed.**

**-~-~-~-~-~-~La Grande – Laura Gibson**

**Mel finds up what's wrong (sort of) and tries to help Charlie.**

**-~-~-~-~-~-~Behold, This Dreamer! – Thieving Irons**

**After talking with Mel, Charlie goes upstairs, faces the music, and checks her messages. This is the lead-up bit where she's mentally preparing herself for it and everything.**

**-~-~-~-~-~-~Working on a Dream – Wintercoats**

**The drive to see whether or not Stiles is okay and her thinking he might be hurt.**

**-~-~-~-~-~-~Death Valley – My Jerusalem (I actually really like the fit with this song—please listen to it)**

**Charlie arrives home and decides to face Peter.**

**-~-~-~-~-~-~Away for the Weekend – Social Studies**


	14. Awkward Silence

**Disclaimer: 'Teen Wolf' isn't mine. Shocking, right? But it's true. If there are any similarities in content or dialogue, it has probably originated with the show.**

**A huge thank you to ParalyzedInHeaven, Atomicity, We're All M-M-Mad Here, skysapphire20, Ayine, Daenerys86, shy-lady, Just Anonymous, Valkyrie101, Micaela M, katiesgotagun, BriancyyD, Shes-The-Proto-Type, pennamethathasn'tbeentaken, meels234, My mother is a koala, She Wolf, Female whovian, shes. .one, TheMMMG, SK-Scatenato, zvc56, WhatsGoingOn, PixieCharm, Guest, Undeniable Weirdness, Lammstrellicon, Guest, Tania, and Just Anonymous for reviewing! I love you all!**

**Okay, so I hope you guys liked the last chapter. I'm sorry if it seemed a little filler-ish or something, but I needed to develop the Mel/Charlie relationship more and I needed to work on the Finstock angle more. Last week I didn't get as many reviews as usual and I hope you guys weren't disappointed or anything. But this is how Charlie works. She's not going to have a sudden emotional epiphany-she's not built like that. I have a plan in mind and I'm sticking to it, and I swear that once you read it, you'll know it couldn't have happened any other way.**

Chapter 14 – Awkward Silence

"_Oh, you have got to be kidding me."_

_The snide tones of Peter Hale echoed against the cold, cinderblock walls and resonated in her ears. The room was completely bare save for the table bolted to the ground, those two chairs, and that large one-way mirrored window. The closest thing there was to decoration were the coffee rings left on the table surface and the mystery stains splotched on the floor. There wasn't even a door—the two of them were totally closed in. The pair was sitting opposite each other in one of those old-school interrogation rooms, torn straight out of the early episodes of 'Law and Order'. Charlie considered it to by a perfectly appropriate setting given what was about to happen. But, as it was with most things, Peter had a few constructive criticisms to make._

"_I mean really, Charlie?" the man demanded, waving his hand around the room. "An interrogation room? Don't you think this a little too on the nose?" He shifted in his seat and the chair wobbled beneath him. One of its legs was just a little too short, making it impossible for him to settle down and get comfortable. Peter glowered down at the chair and let out a small groan. "I mean the least you could have done was spring for some semi-decent furniture."_

_Charlie rolled her eyes and propped her head up on her hand. "Right," she muttered bitterly. "I'll just run and make a quick trip to IKEA, shall I?"_

"_Well honestly I think it's the least you could do," he said with a casual shrug. "And while you're there, pick up a few posters to brighten up the place. This room looks like hepatitis. I feel like I'm in an episode of 'NYPD Blue'."_

_Charlie scrunched up her face and gave him a strange look. "'NYPD Blue'?" she demanded. "How old are you?"_

_Peter narrowed his eyes at her and ground his teeth at her. "That's not the issue here," he said evasively. "The issue is your complete lack of imagination. Honestly, I've been keeping it to my self so far, but I'm beginning to get kind of bored."_

"_Shut up," she spat, glowering at her. "Just be grateful that you're here at all."_

_Peter snapped his fingers and pointed at her, that superior smirk gracing his features yet again. "You're talking about that stuff Deaton gave you."_

_Charlie clenched her fist involuntarily. She hated that face. It was the face Peter always wore when he thought he knew something she didn't. "So what if I am?" she murmured defensively._

_Then he gave her this patronizing look—like he felt sorry for her or something. "Come on, Charlie," he said, shaking his head at her and giving her a skeptical look. "Deaton? Do you really think you can trust him? A stoic mentor figure who knows everything about the problems you're dealing with appears out of nowhere, and that's not the tiniest bit suspicious to you? I mean, really, Charlie. I thought you had more sense than that."_

_Again, Charlie felt the icy sensation of doubt running up and down her spine, making her shiver. Peter might be a son of a bitch, but that didn't mean he wasn't perceptive, and it didn't mean he wasn't right. He was playing to insecurities that were already rattling around in Charlie's brain, drawing them out and making her doubt the potential solution to her problem. "What's the alternative," she shot back, raising her eyebrows at him. "Trusting you?"_

"_You know me, Charlie," he said, placing a hand over his chest. "You know all of my flaws and quirks—"_

"_You mean like your proclivity for murder?" she spat back._

"_You can trust me not to be trustworthy," he barreled on as if she hadn't said anything. "But at the very least you can anticipate me. Or at least you could try. But Deaton?" He winced theatrically and slowly shook his head. "I mean what do you really know about him?"_

_Out of all the things about Peter that she hated, there was one that she found particularly annoying. His tendency to be right. His ability to say what she was thinking, and know she was thinking it. It did nothing to curb the insane degree of arrogance that oozed out of his every pore. "Come on, Charlie," he said earnestly, reaching across the table to take her hand. "You know I really only want what's best for you. Except of course when it conflicts with what's best for me."_

_But Peter's hand only made it half way across the table. It only took a single blink of the eye and suddenly his hands were encased in handcuffs which were bolted to that etched metal table by chains. Suddenly, Peter started laughing gleefully. "Bondage," he cackled, waving at her with what limited movement his hands still had. "I take it back—this is starting to get interesting."_

_Charlie didn't respond immediately. The sarcastic quip was fighting to get out of her, but she held it back. If she quipped, then they would banter and she would totally lose control of the situation. If she lost control, she wouldn't be able to get the answers she wanted._

"_What is it?"_

_The question was posed seriously and dramatically, inviting a serious and dramatic response. Peter's widened slightly and he leaned inwards conspiratorially. "What are you talking about?"_

_Charlie collapsed back in the seat and ran her hands down her face, grunting in frustration. No matter what the circumstance, Peter would always find some way to be a pain in the ass. "You know what I'm talking about," Charlie replied. "The successor to your murderous rampage. What is it?"_

"_How the hell should I know?" he said with a shrug. "Last I checked 'it' wasn't a descriptor. It's a pronoun."_

_Letting out a groan, Charlie let her head fall down, colliding with the table. Count down from ten. Whenever she got really worked up about something, she just had to count down from ten and then everything would be manageable at least. Ten…nine…eight…When she got all the way down to zero she wrenched her head back off the table and stared at Peter evenly. "The new player in town," she elaborated. "It's some sort of lizard monster thing. Any details you might want to share? Anything at all?"_

_Peter pursed his lips and shrugged nonchalantly. "That depends," he mused casually. And then his focus shifted from Charlie to something behind her. Whatever it was, his focus seemed pretty intense. Frowning to herself, Charlie shifted around in her seat to follow his eye line, only to find that he was looking at his own reflection in the one-way mirror, raising his bound hands as far as he could to smooth back his hair. Letting out a loud scoff, Charlie turned back around and smacked him over the head. "Seriously?" she demanded. "You're fixing your hair?!"_

"_Ow!" Peter declared loudly, staring at her with indignation. "Are you trying to be good cop AND bad cop? Please, Charlie. That'll never work out. There's no consistency to it."_

"_How about consistent, unadulterated rage?" she said, rolling her eyes at him. "How does that sound?"_

"_Oh, don't be so dramatic," Peter replied with a roll of the eyes of his own. "That vein in your forehead is throbbing so much it looks like it's going to explode."_

"_Peter—!"_

"_Okay, okay, okay!" Peter said, holding his hands as far out in front of him as he could in self-defense. "Alright, calm yourself! I'll play ball!" Charlie leaned back in her chair, giving him some space. Peter shifted in his seat to get more comfortable and nodded in appreciation before continuing to speak. "Alright," he continued in a matter of fact tone. "Now there is more than one lizard-like creature out there. The first consideration is size. Now on the larger end of the spectrum you have Godzilla, but then again we may have a Ninja Turtle situation on our hands." He cocked his head to the side and looked at her curiously. "Did anybody mention anything about a shell?"_

_She was going to kill him. She was absolutely going to kill him. He might already be dead and he might not be corporeal, but none of that mattered. Charlie was going to find a way to make sure that Peter Hale died a second painful and unseemly death. Or was it his third? Well that depended on perspective more than anything else, but honestly Charlie really didn't give a shit. She was too busy hating the man sitting across from her. "You know what I'm going to do?" she demanded rhetorically, leaning in with menace. "I'm going to conjure myself up a machete, and I'm going to cut a bitch. Spoiler alert! The bitch is you."_

_Peter exhaled loudly and pressed his lips together in a wan, patronizing smile. "Charlie, you're overreacting."_

"_H—overreacting?" she spat back. "You know what? No. Just no. Congratulations Peter. There is now officially no purpose to you whatsoever. You're like a piece of popcorn caught in my teeth that I just can't manage to get out. There's no flavor any more. You're just…a mild annoyance. Soon enough you'll just melt away and I won't have to deal with your crap anymore."_

_Peter frowned and sat back in his chair. He actually looked a little bit offended at that. As per usual, though, that only lasted about half a second before that usual swagger returned. He sighed and wrenched his hands backwards, making the chains fall away like they had been made of yarn. "Come on, Charlie," he said, gesturing at himself. "Clearly I am an asset to you. It's not my fault if you're not using me correctly."_

"_That's just fantastic," Charlie spat, throwing her hands in the air. "Just freaking perfect. You're blaming me for your uselessness. Way to take responsibility for yourself."_

"_Oh, grow up," Peter groaned. He leaned back in his chair and rested his hands behind his head, as casual and comfortable as he could possibly could. Charlie felt a sudden wave of frustration and hostility. He was in an interrogation room, surrounded by dust, concrete, and metal, sitting in a wobbly chair, and he was still as smug as ever. And then her worst fear came to pass. His lips twitched slightly, forcing back yet another smirk. A full-on smirk was fine, but a repressed smirk? That meant he had just found himself a new angle. Charlie sighed and collapsed back in her chair just as Peter leaned forwards in his. He rested his elbows on the surface of the table and perched his head on his folded hands, looking at her with sympathy. "So…." he murmured gently. "This business with you and Stiles—"_

"_You have got to be freaking kidding me!"_

_Immediately Charlie threw herself out of the chair and began pacing back and forth. He was putting her on the defensive. Even when he was the 'perp' in the wobbly chair, he was putting her on the defensive. This was never how it worked in the crime shows. The cops were never the ones on the defensive. Man, she sucked at this—the interrogation thing. Then again the interrogation was a bit useless when the person sitting across the table from you literally had nothing to use. Charlie wished with everything she had that Peter would just stop talking, but she knew full well that would never happen._

"_Come on, Charlie," he said, looking up at her with entreating puppy dog eyes that made her want to punch him in the face. "It's not like it's something you can ignore. You're going to school tomorrow and you know who's going to be sitting right next to you in first period?"_

"_Lalalalala," Charlie chanted, sticking her fingers in her ears and shaking her head like a toddler having a tantrum. "I am not listening to you. This is me actively not listening to you."_

"_That's right," Peter said, raising his voice so she could hear him. "It's gonna be Stiles. And guess what he's going to want to talk about?" Charlie clapped her hands over her ears and let out a pathetic whining noise, making Peter's smirk widen. "He looked so sad in your rear view mirror!" Peter barreled on. "Like one of those baby pelicans coated in oil after the BP oil spill."_

"_Why are you talking about this?!" Charlie screeched rounding on him._

_Peter lifted his hands in the air and shrugged in bemusement. "I am invested in you and your happiness."_

_Charlie's face scrunched up into an expression of distaste. "Ugh. Bite me, Oprah."_

_Finally, Peter himself got out of the chair. He pushed back from the table violently, making his chair clatter to the ground behind him. He marched towards her with strong, intimidating steps towards her. Charlie instinctively pulled back, shrinking slightly as he advanced on her. Suddenly she felt like she had to escape. Her eyes darted left and right, but there was nowhere to go. Leave it to her to pick a dreamscape with no available exits. She ended up backed up in the corner of the room, pushing herself against the concrete like she was trying to disappear into it. _

_Peter reached forwards, making her flinch. The last time he had been this close to her, his hand was closed around her throat. But this time he didn't go for her jugular. He grasped both of her shoulders and tried to convey something that seemed eerily similar to comfort. "I'm not going to try and lecture you, Charlie—"_

"_Really?" she scoffed. "You could've fooled me."_

_Peter chuckled and shook his head at her. "Always so combative. Charlie, do me a favor. Take a good long look at yourself, and figure out what's on the other side of the reflection. Figure out what you want—better yet what you need. And when you do, then do something about it."_

_With one final smirk, Peter released her and clapped his hands together twice before vanishing into the thin air. Vanishing. Like he was Mary freaking Poppins. And he left his words there, hovering around her and lingering like a bad smell._

_Wrapping her arms around her waist, Charlie continued to pace back and forth. She was stuck in a room with no door, only her own reflection for company. Alone with her thoughts—way, way too many thoughts. Which was the last place she wanted to be. Peter could just check out whenever he felt like it. She couldn't._

_The frustration began to build, filling Charlie up. There was too much to deal with. Random lizard monster? Fine, she could handle that. At least she might be able to if she had her shit together. Charlie was usually the type of person who could keep it together. Now, though? Now she was a hot mess._

_All of the sudden a wave of claustrophobia smacked Charlie in the face. That room was small. Way, way too small. Or maybe it was her problem that felt too big for the space. She needed to be out. She needed space—air—but there was nowhere for her to go. Her breaths began to come out quicker and more panicked. It felt like somebody had dropped a freaking anvil on her chest. She continued to pace back and forth more and more frantically, running her hands nervously through her hair. She needed to get out. Now._

_On impulse, Charlie grabbed hold of one of the chairs and swung it at that one-way mirror. There had to be a way out on the other side. At the very least it would give her more space. But the mirror didn't break. So she swung the chair again and again and again. But the mirror still didn't break. Each time metal struck glass there was a slight gonging noise, but it there was never that resounding, satisfying crash. Eventually Charlie's arms were too tired to continue and she was forced to drop the chair, collapsing against the wall and panting to catch her breath._

_Slowly, Charlie turned against the wall until she was facing the mirror, staring at her own reflection. As much as she hated herself for it, she was taking Peter's advice. She looked directly into her eyes and nowhere else, trying to decipher what she saw. And she had no idea. She had no idea what she wanted, no idea what she needed. Or maybe she just didn't want to know. Maybe she was just a coward. Because she was definitely scared._

_Letting out a groan, Charlie let her head fall forwards, colliding with the glass and giving rise to a soft thunk. The coolness of the glass against her forehead had a calming effect. She felt her heart begin to beat slower and the breaths fogging the mirror came out more evenly. The anxiety was beginning to seep away. Until that haunting sound reached her ears._

_At first Charlie glanced around, trying to find the source of the noise, but she didn't see anything in the room. And that's when she realized it was coming from the other side of the glass. Immediately Charlie wrenched her head back and stared at mirror. The volume of the noise continued to grow until that haunting hiss filled the room. There was someone on the other side. _

_Soon enough the noise got so loud the glass began to shake. Charlie started backing away from the mirror, her eyes widening in anticipation. She sucked in a deep breath and it caught in her chest. Suddenly she collided with the table, stumbling a bit and clutching the surface to keep herself standing._

_CRASH!_

_Scales. Claws. Teeth. Blood. And then nothing._

"Holy shit!"

Charlie bolted straight up, gulping in breaths so violently she felt she might choke on them. It was a dream. It was just a dream. At first her mind was racing at a million miles a minute to the point where she felt like the room was spinning. Her hands grasped the sheets, balling up into fists as she attempted to reorient herself. After blinking a few times, her vision sharpened and she could see that she was back in her room. Safe.

Letting out a breath, Charlie tried to calm herself down. There was a thick sheen of sweat covering her body, making her hair stick to her face, and her body was twisted into the sheets like she had been thrashing violently through the night. But it was more than that. Her eyes ached. It was the same kind of pain she felt after staring at the sun for two long—a sort of internal pain radiating outwards. Slowly, she raised her hands to her face and wiped under eyes, feeling the moisture there. When she pulled her hand back, she could see that it was covered in black. At first she jolted, like she had been given an electrical shock, but then she calmed down almost as immediately. She hadn't been crying that black liquid, she had just been crying. With everything that happened last night she had forgotten to remove her makeup and the tears had mingled with the mascara and eyeliner before streaking down her face.

A pitiful whine emanated from Charlie's mouth and she collapsed back on her pillow, sighing in frustration. She had gone to sleep with a single goal in mind—get at least some information about the new threat in town—and, yet again, she had failed miserably. She kept trying to take a step forward, and instead ended up taking two steps back. Pretty soon she was going to end up backing out over a cliff. She made a move to run her hands through her hand, but the suddenly her palms began to sting harshly. Frowning to herself, she pulled her hands back and looked down at them in confusion. Both palms were marked by a small semi-circle of four deep puncture marks. It was only then that she noticed there was blood under her fingernails. While she was sleeping she had clenched her fists so tight she had ended up stabbing herself with her own fingernails.

"Suck it up, Oswin," she muttered to herself. She sucked in one more deep breath before throwing the covers back and clambering out of bed and heading towards the bathroom. She just needed a shower. She just needed to wash the sweat and tears from her body and then she would be fine. At least that's what she kept telling herself.

The sun had barely started peeking through the curtains, and Charlie found herself already dressed for school. Normally she would have laid in bed, wrapped in blankets and contemplating smashing her alarm clock to bits every time the snooze alarm went off, but not this time. After that dream there was no way in hell she could come even close to falling back asleep. Which meant she had a solid hour to prepare herself for the day. So now she found herself sitting on the bed in that pair of brown leather pants and this cropped silk patterned shirt Lydia had insisted she buy on one of their shopping expeditions, and a cream-colored tweed jacket with fingerless gloves pulled on to hide the puncture marks in her palms. Hell, she had even done her makeup just like Lydia had taught her, getting rid of all the puffy circles under her eyes. She almost looked normal. Almost.

It was all still swirling around in her mind, pushing everything else out. The hallucinations, Deaton, the kiss, that dream—it was all in her head all at once. Stiles hadn't been lying when he said she had a haunted look about her. It was written across her face plain as day. And she was just sitting there, staring at that little ray of light peeking through the curtains, almost like she was paralyzed. Usually she would just distract herself by talking to somebody—one of two people to be exact. Only this time one of the two people was part of the problem. Which left just one other person. Lydia. Turns out that morning they were in for a bit of a role reversal.

Charlie jumped up from her bed and began shoving all her books in her purse as quickly as possible before making a mad dash out the door. It was still a full 45 minutes before school started, but Lydia wouldn't mind the intrusion. She was the only morning person Charlie had ever met. Other than Mel. The pair of them must be superhuman somehow. They could wake up ready to take the world by storm while the rest of the puny humans were staggering around bleary-eyed, desperately seeking caffeine in any form possible. Running her hands through her still damp hair, she tried to get it into some semblance of order before knocking on the door. It was a minute or so before the door opened, but it wasn't Lydia on the other side.

"Charlie, hello," Mrs. Martin said, leaning against the door. "How are you?"

Charlie blinked in surprise at the woman. Usually she looked so put together and polished, but this morning was a bit of a different story. Not because her clothes were drab or rumpled—they were as perfect as ever—but she had a frazzled expression on her face. "H—hi, Mrs. Martin," Charlie said with a small wave. "I was just stopping by to see if maybe Lydia wanted to grab breakfast or something before school today."

Mrs. Martin's hand tightened around the door knob at the mention of her daughter and a tight, slightly pained expression covered her face. "I—I'm afraid she can't. Not this morning at least."

Charlie's eyebrows pulled together in a concerned frown. "Is she okay?"

"Yes, she's fine," Mrs. Martin said, waving her hand dismissively in a way that was not at all convincing. The woman exhaled sharply and her head sagged on her shoulders, staring at her feet for a few moments before looking back up at Charlie. "She's already at school," Mrs. Martin admitted. "She's with the school counselor for an appointment. After everything, I thought it was something she might need."

"And she agreed to that?" Charlie asked, a little taken aback.

Mrs. Martin let out a shaky and laughed. "The word reluctant comes to mind, but I did eventually manage to get her to agree." She bit her lip and bounced up and down on her feet a bit before leveling Charlie with a serious look. "I wasn't supposed to tell anybody, but she needs people looking after her. Do you think you can be one of those people?"

It felt like getting kicked in the gut, and it took everything she had not to show it. She forced a comforting smile and nodded at the woman. "I already am."

Mrs. Martin returned the smile and placed a hand on Charlie's shoulder. "I know, sweetie."

With that, Mrs. Martin flashed one last wan smile retreated back behind the door, leaving Charlie, once again, alone with even more troubling thoughts than she had woken up with. Lydia. After that freak out she had known something was wrong, but with everything that was going on in her own life she had never really dealt with it. Lydia wasn't the type of person to ask for help—she had to have help forced on her. And usually Charlie was standing right next to her, helping her deal, whether it was by having meaningful conversations about feelings or letting Lydia drag her out shopping. This time, though, she had been missing in action, which meant that Lydia was by herself.

Well that ended right now.

Hopping in her car, Charlie drove straight to the school. When she pulled into the parking lot the thing was still virtually empty. Just a few of the teachers' cars and one very familiar Beetle. Charlie pulled her Impala up next to that Beetle and hopped out, marching through the school and making a direct line to the school counselor's office. The row of green seats lined against the wall opposite the office door looked oddly ominous. It's where you sat and waited to be judged by some hack armed with an undergraduate psych degree, a clicky pen, and a clipboard. They would tell you what was wrong with you and what you needed, like they knew what you were going through better than you did. Charlie had sat in one of those seats more than once. It was never fun.

Ignoring her natural aversion to people who tried to psychoanalyze her, Charlie tossed her bag in one of those green chairs and collapsed into the one next to it. She stared at the door to the counselor's office. It had a huge glass pane in it that let you see straight through, which struck her as an odd thing seeing as a counselor's office might attempt a higher degree of privacy, but it meant that she could see her friend's wavy strawberry blonde locks as she faced down…..Ms. Morell? What the hell was the French teacher doing advising Lydia on her mental health?

Charlie sat in that chair for about a half hour, waiting for the session to end. The hallways slowly started filling with students as the time ticked closer and closer to the beginning of classes. It was only about five minutes before the bell rang that she saw Lydia get up to her feet and primly sling her purse over her shoulder. The girl spun on her heel and dramatically flipped her hair over her shoulder, probably aiming for some kind of dramatic exit, but when she saw Charlie sitting there, she stopped short, a tiny scowl forming on her face. Charlie smiled and gave a weak wave, but that just made the scowl deepen even further.

"My mom told you, didn't she?" Lydia demanded, wrenching open the door to the counselor's office.

"Good morning to you too, Lydia," Charlie said, slowly getting to her feet and looking the girl up and down. "You're looking fantastic as usual. Love the gloves."

Lydia let out a scoff and marched straight past Charlie, forcing the other girl to jog after her, struggling to keep up. How she managed to walk in that fast in those heels, Charlie would never understand. "That woman is unbelievable," Lydia said with a shake of the head. "I tell her I'm fine, she signs me up for a counseling session. I tell her not to tell anybody about that session, and she blabs to you. You think there would be some sort of mother-daughter confidentiality agreement, but no!" She glanced at Charlie through narrowed eyes. "So isn't this the part where you ask me whether or not I'm okay?"

It was a trap. Charlie knew it was a trap. But she asked the question anyway, sighing heavily before she did so. "Are you okay?"

"Thank you so much for asking, Charlie!" Lydia said with false enthusiasm. "I'm fantastic! Except for the fact that my mother and my best friend are talking about me behind my back."

"I don't talk about you with your mom," Charlie insisted with a roll of her eyes. "I stopped by to see if you wanted breakfast and she said that you had an appointment with the guidance counselor. It's not like there's some vast conspiracy." She looked at Lydia with raised eyebrows. "We good?"

Lydia pursed her lips together and eyed Charlie suspiciously. "That depends," she murmured quietly.

"Oh what?" Charlie asked shrugging her shoulders.

"On how much you and my mom chat," Lydia replied, looking more than a little bit worried. "What else have the two of you been talking about? What else has she mentioned.?"

Charlie sighed and looked up at the ceiling, as if in thought. "Well we did have that one very spirited conversation about which member of One Direction was the cutest—"

Lydia let out a scandalized scoff and smacked Charlie on the shoulder. "Be serious!"

"I steadfastly refuse to be serious," Charlie shot back. "It's a ridiculous question. Your mom and I don't have tea parties where we eat cucumber sandwiches and drink out of ridiculously tiny cups while holding out our pinky fingers and chatting about you. She just told me why you had left for school early. That's it."

Lydia stopped short in the hallway and stared at Charlie through narrowed eyes, like she was analyzing her or something. Charlie actually felt herself go tense. This was why it was so difficult to be worried about Lydia. She was so determined to be perfectly okay, the second you suggested she wasn't she would either clam up or get angry. The closer you got to finding out what was wrong, the more she shut you out. Which was why in order to take that step forwards, sometimes you had to back off and let her be. So Charlie was backing off. She wasn't going to ask any questions or appear curious in any way. She was going to quietly monitor.

Apparently Charlie passed whatever inspection she was being put through, because Lydia began to nod slowly. "Good. Keep it that way."

After that Lydia seemed to let the whole thing go, which more than a little bit of a relief for Charlie. When she felt like it, Lydia could hold quite the grudge. Which was why it was such a relief when Lydia started rambling on about how pointless the whole thing had been in the first place. And it was why Charlie nodded along like she wasn't slowly tearing herself to pieces on the inside. "I don't see how the whole counseling session thing would be helpful anyway," Lydia trilled, brushing her hair over her shoulder like she was brushing off the experience. "Like talking about your feelings is actually going to change anything. I mean what's the next step—holding hands and singing a duet? The whole thing is ridiculous."

Lydia continued to ramble on about how annoying and overprotective her mother was being and how stupid therapy was, but Charlie could definitely tell that there was still something slightly off in her demeanor. It was a look that hovered just behind her eyes. Something was bothering her and it had nothing to do with her mother or the counseling session or anything like that. It wasn't a deeply troubling thing that was bothering her—it was something small that had stuck in her craw and she couldn't spit out. Then the two of them found themselves at Lydia's locker, unloading her books. The girl stared into the locker, a mild frown tugging at the corner of her lips. "Charlie," she murmured in a mildly troubled tone. "Do you think I'm narcissistic?"

Charlie leaned back against the lockers and made a face at her. "Why would you ask me that?"

"No reason," Lydia chirped in an oddly high-pitched voice. "Just something some boy said to me." She closed her locker and looked at Charlie pointedly. "So do you?"

Charlie shrugged her shoulders and said the first words that came to mind. "Yeah. Kind of."

Lydia's mouth dropped open, suddenly looking horrified. "Charlie, how could you say that?"

"I'm sorry," she said with a semi-apologetic shrug. "I thought we were doing the thing where you asked a question and I answered it." Lydia glared at Charlie, eyes spitting fire, and Charlie sighed loudly. "Ugh. Look, Lydia, you're flawed. News flash—we all are. And there are plenty of narcissistic people out there. The good news is you actually have a reason to be narcissistic. You're awesome. Most narcissistic people don't have enough positive qualities to make their narcissism warranted."

Lydia pursed her lips and linked her arm through Charlie's, cocking her head to the side in thought. "That might be the nicest thing you've ever said to me."

Charlie let out a snort and rolled her eyes. "Bullshit."

"Charlie!" Lydia exclaimed through an offended scoff. "You're being very harsh during a very delicate time for me! I'm in counseling!"

The statement was phrased as a humorous one, but Charlie could see through Lydia well enough. This was one of the whole 'talk about your problems candidly so nobody will think you're insecure about them' type situations. Heading off tension with humor. That was move number one out of the Charlie Oswin playbook. And Charlie knew what that meant. Lydia wasn't ready to admit to anything yet, so she would play along.

"Please," she replied with as casual a tone as she could muster. "You think you have trauma? You just had a near death experience. That's it. I, on the other hand, was forced to witness my aunt snuggling up next to Coach Finstock. My eyes are burning. I'm the one in need of counseling here."

Immediately a wince covered Lydia's face and she shook her head in disappointment. "Ugh," she muttered. "I've got to say, I am disappointed in your aunt. I always pictured her more with a Daniel Craig stoic type of guy. She was supposed to be the sane member of your family. Apparently the Oswin girls have a fondness for weird, twitchy men." At the mention of Stiles Charlie paled visibly, but that just made Lydia smile widely. "What? You thought just because we haven't been talking about it I forgot about your little ice rink confession? Please, Charlie. Who do you think you're talking to?"

Charlie had just begun babbling incoherently, but before she could even manage to mumble out some denials she was rudely interrupted by the shrill tone of the bell. Immediately she froze as a wave of panic shot through her. She was panicking because she knew where she would have to go next. And who she would have to face next. It had felt like there was more time. She needed more time to prepare.

"Well we can talk about your soon-to-be boy-toy later," Lydia said loudly, making Charlie jump. The red-head applied some lip gloss, staring into the mirror of her compact before smacking her lips together loudly. "I'll see you later."

"Wh—what?" Charlie stammered out shaking her head to reorient her thoughts.

Then Lydia looked at her like she was crazy. "It may have escaped your attention, Charlie," she said, waving her hand around, "but we're in school. In school we typically go to these things called classes. My class is that way." She pointed left down the hallway. "Your class is that way." She pointed in the opposite direction. "This is where we leave each other."

Charlie glared at Lydia for the excessive amount of sarcasm, but Lydia just shrugged back innocently. "What? You seemed confused." And with that and one more dramatic flip of the hair, Lydia stomped off in the direction of her class, her easy natural confidence intact. Charlie, on the other hand, couldn't maintain that sort of self-possession. She suddenly felt small and scared. Walking towards English class felt kind of like walking the plank. She wasn't ready for it. She wasn't ready to face him yet.

As she walked down the hallway, Charlie's pace was slow. Other students brushed quickly past her, knocking into her shoulders and jostling her as she moved. All the while she clutched on to the strap of her messenger bag like it was a security blanket, the wounds in her palm stinging as they rubbed roughly against the bandages she had wrapped them in.

By the time Charlie got to Mr. Hobson's classroom, the second bell had already rung and she was running late. Though that had been her intention. If she showed up for class late, then she wouldn't be able to talk to anyone about anything or face the wrath of Mr. Hobson. She was safe. But as she walked up to the door, she realized the fatal flaw in her plan. All of the other students had filled in their seats, leaving only one left. One that was right next to Stiles.

Charlie came to a stop in the doorway of the room, scared of crossing that threshold. Her eyes zeroed in on one spot. Stiles was sitting at his desk, head sagging and tapping his pen absently against his open notebook. Her heart seized up as she watched him. It felt like her body was at war with itself. Half of her wanted to go up to him and kiss him again and the other half wanted to sprint straight in the opposite direction and hide. Those two equally opposing forces kept her rooted in place. That is until the highly embittered voice of Mr. Hobson imposed itself on her ears.

"Ms. Oswin, you should know where your seat is by now," he drawled out. "Please take it."

At the mention of her name, Stiles's head snapped up from the desk. Immediately their eyes found each other, and almost just as quickly Charlie had to look away. There was way to much in his gaze—fear, worry, anticipation, and, more than anything, the desire to talk. But how could they talk when Charlie still had no idea what to say?

Sucking in a deep breath, Charlie bowed her head and wound through the desks to find her seat, staring intently at her feet and nowhere else. She could feel Stiles's eyes on her as she moved, but she still couldn't bring herself to look at him. She managed to glance at Scott for a moment, but the floppy-haired wonder just smiled and waved back like nothing had changed at all. And that meant Stiles hadn't told him. Stiles told Scott everything, but he hadn't told him about last night. Shit. She wasn't sure if she was grateful or if that just made her even more anxious. Things were becoming way, way too complicated.

Making her way to her desk, Charlie dropped her bag on the floor and rooted out a pen and notebook before settling in place. He was still looking at her, studying the side of her face. It felt like his gaze was burning a hole in her skin. Then, finally, she sent a glance in his direction. His expression was so earnest it made her stomach begin to twist itself into knots.

"Hey," he whispered quietly, his voice oddly raspy.

Charlie's lips twitched slightly, attempting to form a smile. "Hey," she said in a barely audible voice.

And then that was it. That was all they said to each other. Sure they continued to stare at each other awkwardly and there was clearly a lot that needed to be said, but neither of them could verbalize it. It was exactly what Charlie had been afraid of. The two of them could usually talk to each other about anything. Well, almost anything. And now they were rendered mute. Charlie and Stiles—two of the loudest and most talkative people in the entire school—couldn't make themselves say a damn thing. And it broke her heart.

Swallowing heavily, Charlie summoned up the courage to speak, shooting Stiles a few hesitant glances before she could make herself. "So, uh, I—I heard you had an eventful night last night," she murmured under her breath, nervously tapping her pen against paper. Stiles's eyebrows pulled together in confusion at the comment and suddenly Charlie was hit with a pang of anxiety. Two eventful things had happened last night—a kiss and an attack—and he wasn't sure which one she was talking about. "The—the mechanic's," Charlie elaborated, her voice shaking the tiniest bit. "On that message you left….it sounded pretty bad."

Stiles exhaled sharply and nodded. "Uh, yeah," he stammered, bobbing his head. "Yeah, that giant lizard thing Scott and Allison were talking about showed up. Turns out it secretes some paralytic goo. I—" he waved his hand around a bit "—I got some on my hand. Not a fun experience."

"Terrifying, cool, and gross all at once," Charlie said with false levity. "Looks like we hit the trifecta with this one, haven't we?"

"H—yeah," Stiles laughed out. "Now all we have to do is figure out what it is."

"Agreed," Charlie said with a nod. "I'll check Wikipedia and you can start putting up wanted posters with a picture of the GEICO gecko on it. See what shakes out."

A small but genuine smile appeared on Stiles's face and he let out a clear, crisp laugh. Charlie wasn't sure why, but that expression made her feel hopeful. Like maybe they could skip all of it and go back to normal. But unfortunately it soon faded away and was replaced by that same awkward, almost pleading one. That is until he looked away.

Stiles began drumming his fingers against the desk, shooting fleeting glances in her direction, but never maintaining eye contact. "So….." he drawled out, finally able to look at her fully again. "So, uh, so my dad said you dropped by the crime scene."

All of the sudden the sound of the tapping stopped. Stiles's hands were perfectly still, like he didn't want anything to interrupt her response. Charlie swallowed heavily again and nodded. "Uh, yeah," she murmured, tucking her hair behind her ears and nervously tugging at the ends of it. "Yeah, I did."

Stiles didn't say anything after that, but his eyes held that silent question. _'Why?'_

"I—I had to make sure you were okay," she muttered. "After that voicemail, you know?"

"Y—yeah," Stiles breathed out shakily. "Hey, I get it."

The two of them stared at each other for a little while. Charlie could feel the anxiety rising up inside of her by the second, like it kept filling her up until she felt like she was going to explode. "So are you?" she mumbled weakly.

Stiles blinked at her in confusions. "Am I what?"

"Okay," Charlie repeated, inclining her head in his direction. "Are you okay?"

"Wha—yeah," Stiles said, nodding almost frantically. "Yeah. I'm good."

The corners of Charlie's lips pulled up a bit, forming the ghost of a smile. "Good."

"A—and you?" Stiles pressed. "Are you oka—"

"Mr. Stilinski, Ms. Oswin," a deadened voice interrupted. "Is there something you wish to share with the class?" Charlie and Stiles both jumped in their seats, their heads snapping in the direction of the front of the classroom. The classroom that the both of them seemed to have forgotten they were sitting in. Mr. Hobson was standing at the chalkboard, hands planted on hips and glowering at the two of them. And then, almost in unison, all of the other heads in the room turned around to look at them as well. It was almost like a scene from the Discovery Channel with all the meercats looking in the same direction. Usually it was cute. This time it was close to horrifying.

Usually Charlie or Stiles or the both of them together would have had something to say—either a snarky comment or a semi-apologetic comment—but this time they were both completely quiet. Neither of them said a damn thing. They just shook their heads and let that be that. After one last mildly hostile comment Mr. Hobson he continued on with the lesson and most of the meercats turned back in the direction of the chalkboard. All except one that is. Allison was staring at Charlie with the weirdest look in her eye.

For the rest of the class she was completely silent. And so was Stiles. But her mind wasn't. Her mind wouldn't shut the hell up. It kept telling her how close she was sitting to him. Less three feet—that was how far. Give or take a few inches. And then came the flashbacks. First it was all the times he had told her how much he loved Lydia. All fourteen of them. And then it was their kisses. All two of them—one of which really didn't count in the first place.

She could do math. She was making an A in pre-Calculus. It just didn't add up.

As soon as that bell signifying the end of class rang, Charlie didn't waste any time. She jumped up from her seat, grabbed her bags, and ran out the door. It all happened in the space of a breath. Specifically the breath Stiles was taking before he tried to speak to her again. She didn't look back. She forced herself not to look back. She needed time to let this go—she needed distance. She needed to be able to think.

The rest of the day she kind of felt like a ninja. Not in the way that she was constantly being mysterious and kicking ass which, quite frankly would have been fun and more than slightly awesome, but in the way that involved her being a complete ghost. As far as anybody was concerned, when she wasn't sitting in a desk and allowing the knowledge of such well–renown educators to wash over her, she didn't exist. She ate lunch in the darkest corner of the library, she hid in the girl's bathroom in between classes, she left school grounds during free period—all of it to avoid Stiles and that conversation she was fairly sure would destroy her. She pretty much hit rock bottom when she saw him headed down the hallway in her direction, talking with Scott, and ducked into a storage closet to hide from him. She literally stood next to a mop for a full two minutes waiting for him to pass by. And when she opened the door she found herself face-to-face with an extremely confused-looking Allison.

It wasn't until the end of the day that Charlie actually slowed down long enough to actually talk to anybody. That's the problem when all your friends are friends with each other too. If you're trying to avoid one of them, then you have to avoid all of them, and that leaves you totally out of the loop. And avoiding Stiles had been pretty difficult that day. He seemed to be everywhere, running back and forth with a slightly crazed glint in his eye. Staying out of his way was more than slightly difficult.

Finally, the end of day bell rang and Charlie let out a sigh of relief. She didn't even bother passing by her locker before making a break for it and heading for the front door. As soon as she opened it, though, she stopped short, making the person behind her collide with her back. Allison was sitting on one of the benches lining the parking lot talking to none other than Stiles. She could not catch a freaking break.

On instinct, Charlie dodged behind a particularly large ficus, earning more than a few strange looks from passers-by. Soon enough, Stiles gave Allison a parting salute and scurried off to do something else. After counting down from ten, Charlie left her hiding place and sauntered over to Allison as casually as possible. "Hey," Charlie sighed taking a seat next to the girl.

Immediately Allison snapped the book that she was reading shut and gave Charlie the strangest of strange looks. "Where have you been today?" she demanded, staring at Charlie suspiciously. "I feel like I haven't seen you at all."

"Around," she muttered with an evasive shrug. "Here and there. So what's up? What's going on?"

Allison's eyes stayed narrowed, but she seemed to tentatively accept that bullshit response. "Well you missed a lot," she muttered. "We're trying to find out what that lizard thing is. Apparently there's this type of book that's basically a list of mythical creatures—"

"A bestiary?" Charlie supplied.

Allison's eyebrows pulled together in a frown and her mouth opened and closed a few times before nodding. "Um, yeah," she murmured. "Apparently my grandfather should have this big leather-bound book thing and we need to get access to it….You and Stiles really haven't discussed this at all? I mean it's kind of your thing."

"What thing—we don't have a thing."

The words sort of rushed out of Charlie. She muttered them so quickly they were almost unintelligible, which didn't serve to lessen Allison's suspicious looks. "Um, yeah it is," Allison said, raising her eyebrows and nodding slowly. "The two of you sit there and talk about all the supernatural stuff going on until you come up with some sort of half-assed plan that somehow ends up saving the day. You speak in hushed tones…..Star Wars references are usually involved…Is none of this sounding familiar to you?"

Charlie shrugged and jerked her head to the side noncommittally. "It might sound vaguely familiar. But plotting ways to save our bacon is not my only hobby. I have facets—I have layers. I….I play guitar and fix up my car. I am a woman who wears many hats. Metaphorical hats. I rarely ever wear actual hats."

Allison let out a snort and made a face at her. "You're rambling," she stated matter-of-factly.

"Wha—I am not rambling," Charlie protested.

"Yes. Yes you are."

"I am not."

"Why are you avoiding Stiles?"

In retrospect Charlie should probably have expected a question like that. Allison was not an unobservant person and she hadn't been particularly subtle with the ridiculous antics today, but somehow Charlie still managed to be surprised by that question. She shifted in her seat and folded her arms across her chest defensively. "I—I'm not avoiding Stiles," she muttered in a tone that even she herself had to admit wasn't all that convincing.

"Oh," Allison chirped lightly, nodding a bit. "Okay. That's good then, because he's headed back over this way."

"What?!"

Her reaction was almost cartoonish. She jumped about three feet in the air and wheeled around, her head practically doing a 360 on her neck as she looked around. And what did she find? No Stiles. Stiles was nowhere to be seen. And then she realized what happened. She could practically hear the smugness. Slowly, she sat down and turned back to face Allison, only to find herself confronted by the widest of smirks. Charlie let out a long breath and ran her hands through her hair. "Was it really that obvious?" she grumbled under her breath.

"Well my powers of deduction are pretty impressive," Allison sighed out, shrugging innocently. "And then there's the fact that I saw you jump into a closet to when you saw him in the hallway." Charlie covered her face with her hands and let out a pitiful whine, causing Allison to put a comforting hand on her shoulder. "Okay, what's going on with the two of you?" Allison asked. "This morning in English you were talking in the shortest sentences I've ever seen either of you use. You were practically monosyllabic. It kinda creeped me out."

Another groan came from Charlie's throat and she pulled her hands away from her face, looking up at Allison. Her face screwed up into a pained wince and she bit her lip before speaking. "Stiles and I kissed last night," she whispered quietly. "And I don't mean like a peck on the cheek or anything. I mean really kissed. Like if I had been chewing gum, he would then be chewing that gum. That kind of kissing."

The words rushed out of Charlie and she was left staring at Allison expectantly, waiting for a response. Honestly Charlie wasn't sure what type of her reaction her admission would lead to, but she definitely didn't expect the one she got. Silence. Complete stunned silence. The girl was completely quiet, staring at Charlie with her mouth hanging open a bit. "Allison?" Charlie prompted. "This is the part where you say something."

Slowly, that gaping mouth morphed into a ridiculous grin. "Oh, I've got something to say," Allison exclaimed loudly. "Freaking finally! That's what I've got to say about that!" A gleeful laugh burbled out of Allison's mouth and she shook her head happily, sending her brown locks flying about. The comforting hand on Charlie's shoulder tightened and Allison began shaking her in excitement. Until she registered the resigned expression on Charlie's face. "Why are you not at least kind of excited about this?"

"Because it's not a good thing!" Charlie shot back, throwing her hands in the air. "In fact it is a very, very bad thing!"

"How?!" Allison spluttered. "And don't tell it's because you don't have feelings for him. If I have to hear you give the 'we're just good friends speech' one more time, I'm going to have to start throwing things. You kissed. You like each other."

"Just because we kissed doesn't mean he likes me that way," Charlie protested. "Sometimes a kiss is just a kiss."

"Oh, come on," Allison whined, looking at her like she had grown a second head. "What would make you think that?"

"You remember our good friend Lydia?" Charlie drawled out, her voice tinged with bitterness. "Red-head, about yay tall, super-genius? Stiles has been in love with her since the third grade. He has told me so. Frequently. How am I supposed to compete with that, exactly?"

All of he sudden Allison's eyes widened, like she had seized onto something Charlie just said. "AHA!" Allison practically shouted, snapping her fingers and pointing at Charlie. "So you admit that you _do_ want to compete with that! You like Stiles! You totally like him!"

"Would you shut the hell up?!" Charlie hissed, smacking Allison's hand out of her face and looking around self-consciously. "Jesus! You're talking so loud you might as well commission a billboard that says Charlie 'hearts' Stiles!" A glower had fixed itself on Charlie's face, but it did nothing to change the radiant smile shining on Allison's. Charlie's eyes fell shut and she sighed heavily, rubbing at her forehead to stave off the headache threatening to form. "Okay," Charlie murmured, doing her best to keep her voice even. "Okay, yes. I like Stiles. I feel all the fuzzy feelings and they are directed towards Stiles. But that doesn't matter."

"How does that not matter?!"

"Because the feelings are pointless unless they're reciprocated!" she hissed back, throwing her hands in the air in frustration. "Stiles likes Lydia, and I'm fine with just being friends. It's fine, I'm fine, everything's fine."

At that point Allison let out a strangled cry of frustration and balled her delicate little hands into fists. "Charlie, everything is not fine!" she exclaimed. "You were hiding in a broom closet! That is pretty much the antithesis of fine!" Then she clamped her mouth shut and got this constipated expression on her face, like she was trying to calm herself down. It was a few more moments before she spoke again. "Okay," she said in a carefully moderated tone. "So what are you going to do now?"

Charlie opened and closed her mouth a few times and shrugged. "I've generally been a fan of ignoring a problem until the situation resolves itself."

Allison frowned in concern. "Charlie," she whispered. "What are you afraid of?"

Charlie jerked her head to the side noncommittally and made a face. "Clowns, bears, giant sewer monsters, avian flu—"

"Be serious!" Allison interrupted in an accusatory tone. "What are you afraid of?"

Charlie's mouth moved, trying to form words, but she honestly wasn't sure what to say. "I—I don't know," she mumbled. "Everything?"

At that Allison's expression softened. She bit her lip and ran a hand through her hair, letting out a sigh. "You're going to have to talk to him about it eventually," she pointed out.

Charlie pressed her lips together and shook her head. "I can't do that."

"Why not?"

"Because I can't have it be weird!" she insisted. "Stiles is one of my best friends! I don't think I could handle it if the way we acted around each other just suddenly changed. It…it would hurt too much. It could ruin everything."

"Right," Allison said, raising her eyebrows. "So you're just going to avoid him."

"For now, yeah."

"Mm-hm," Allison said, nodding her head in a way that was oddly patronizing. "And how is you constantly avoiding him any different than 'ruining your friendship' by talking to him. Either way, you're not friends anymore. So what exactly do you have to lose?"

The truth of those words smacked Charlie face with such force she actually physically felt her body jerk backwards slightly. Allison was right. There was no difference. Avoiding Stiles was just as destructive as talking to him would be. Either way, she was totally screwed. And the worst part about it was that, even faced with that knowledge, she was still too afraid to talk to him. When it came down to it, she was a coward.

Charlie must have looked pretty pathetic sitting there with sagging shoulders and emotional turmoil written all over her face. Allison let out a tiny sigh and got to her feet, holding a hand out to help Charlie up. After staring at it for a few moments, Charlie took it and allowed herself to be hauled to her feet. "Come on, Charlie," Allison murmured, wrapping an arm around the girl's shoulders. "We've get a lacrosse game to get ready for, a History test to study for, and a bestiary to steal. It's gonna be a busy night."

The two girls walked through the parking lot in the direction of their cars, Allison explaining the new half-assed plan she and Stiles had developed to get their hands on her psycho grandfather's book. As they walked Charlie's eyes found their way to the lacrosse field. Right now in the daylight it looked innocuous enough—just green grass and white lines. But in a couple of hours, it would become a battlefield. And they would all be part of the fight.

**PREVIEW: Charlie goes for a swim.**

**CHAPTER 14 SOUNDTRACK**

**And here's the obligatory reminder that I have a Spotify account. You can find the link on my profile.**

**The dream. The song would start when Peter disappears and leaves Charlie alone. Charlie would grab the chair and start slamming it into the mirror at about the 2:10 minute mark.**

**-~-~-~-~-~-~Somewhere Else – Indians**

**Charlie wakes up, recovers from the dream, and gets ready for school.**

**-~-~-~-~-~-~Run – Let's Buy Happiness**

**Lydia and Charlie talk and Charlie walks to English class, freaking out a bit.**

**-~-~-~-~-~-~Rabbit Hole – The Lower 48**

**Charlie and Stiles have the most uncomfortable conversation ever and Charlie runs out of class.**

**-~-~-~-~-~-~ Lady of Late - Priory**

**Charlie dodges Stiles. Picture a bunch of jump cuts of her doing ridiculous, almost slapstick things to avoid be detected.**

**-~-~-~-~-~-~Hats And Glasses – The Anomalies**

**Allison tries to comfort Charlie and the two walk to their cars.**

**-~-~-~-~-~-~Never Never - Khushi**


	15. The Big Reveal

**Disclaimer: 'Teen Wolf' isn't mine. Shocking, right? But it's true. If there are any similarities in content or dialogue, it has probably originated with the show.**

**A huge thank you to We're All M-M-Mad Here, AmyRoxx123, Guest 1, Guest 2, Valkyrie101, Shes-The-Proto-Type, Devon Laurel, pennamethathasn'tbeentaken, SK-Scatenato, My mother is a koala, Noxen, AyeKay10, VampireWizardsWeresOhMy, bagginsoftheshire666, Atomicity, zvc56, Sonny13, PhoenixRage92, L. , WillowSeeker, Gee Brittany, TheMMMG, katiesgotagun, Undeniable Weirdness, Paige, Etro13, shy-lady, Just Anonymous, Oracle90, Ayine, PurpleRaining, onethousandmoths, BewareTheBearShark, Guest 3, Guest 4, Guest 5, Guest 6, and Guest 7 for reviewing!**

**Sorry for any errors in spelling, grammar, etc. I published this at 3am. I just needed it out there in the world and stuff. I might go back and edit a bit to make it perfect, but for now here you go!  
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Chapter 15

"Come on, Charlie! Get ready! We're leaving in five! We can't be late!"

Mel's overly cheerful voice echoed up the stairs, resonating in Charlie's room. Under normal circumstance the gleeful tone would have conjured up images of rainbows and puppies and hugs and unicorns in Charlie's head, but at the moment things were a little too dark for that. She had asshole werewolves and crazy, paralysis-inducing lizard monsters lurking in the shadows of her mind.

Allison had given Charlie the basic summary of the plan to get her grandfather's bestiary. Apparently it was kept in his office, under lock and key at all times. They had a plan to sort it out, though. A fairly simple one too. Which was a good thing. In her experience simple plans were the best sort of plans. The fewer steps that existed, the fewer points there were where something could go horribly, epically wrong. Unfortunately for Charlie, none of those steps involved her. Apparently that's what happened when you disappeared into a broom closet for a full day. You got written out of the script.

The plan went thusly. Allison would convince her grandfather to go to the lacrosse game with her, thereby ensuring that he would not be in that aforementioned office and allowing their shenanigans to ensue. Whilst at the game, Allison would manage to lift the keys from her grandfather. After that she would manage to pass the keys off to Stiles and he would then neatly ransack the office until he found the book. Short, sweet, and to the point. And she had absolutely no role in it whatsoever. She had offered to just pick the lock, but apparently Gerard had some fancy reinforced deadbolt installed before he started working at the high school. That's what happened when you were an experienced hunter with over fifty years of experience. You got paranoid.

Charlie sat cross-legged on her bed, French books open around her, scribbling frantically in her notebook as she prepared for the French test on Wednesday. She had been conjugating verbs ever since she got home, and ink was now covering her hands. Not that she really had to—French wasn't Chemistry, it just sort of clicked for –but she did it anyway. There was a sort of easy redundancy to it that lulled her into a sort of trance. Time just melted away. Which was simultaneously a good thing and a bad thing. On one hand it meant she spent a full two and a half hours not epically freaking out. On the other hand it felt like somebody snapped their fingers and those few hours had disappeared, leaving her to deal with the same crap all over again.

"CHARLIE!"

Letting out a frustrated sight, Charlie snapped her notebook shut and tossed her pen aside before clambering off the bed. "Alright, alright," she shouted back, doing her best not to trip over the piles of paper that stacked up around her. "I'm coming. Calm yourself, woman!"

A tiny scoff echoed up the stairs. "I'm not un-calm," Mel said in a slightly shrill tone. "I just want to be there on time. Is that a crime?"

During her mad dash to get ready, her eyes strayed in the direction of the alarm clock and all of the sudden she came to a screeching halt. The glaring red numbers read out 4:46 pm, making Charlie roll her eyes. Apparently the conjugations hadn't been as effective as she had thought. "You've got to be frigging kidding m—MEL!" Charlie threw her bag back on the ground and marched towards the stairs, grumbling to herself. "Mel, it's not even 5:00 yet! The game doesn't even start until 6:00! Why the hell are you dragging me back to school over an hour before the game star—Dear God, what are you wearing?"

Charlie came to a stop at the top of the stairs, gaping down at her aunt who was standing in the foyer. Frowning slightly, Mel looked down at her clothes before returning her gaze to Charlie. "What? What's wrong?"

Immediately, Charlie's mouth dropped open while her eyebrows shot up. Lacrosse didn't have cheerleaders—something which Stiles had very loudly lamented on numerous occasions—but Mel was getting as close as anybody else. Sure she had forgone the short skirts and pompoms, opting instead on some slim-fit jeans—it was way too cold for the skirts anyway—but she definitely oozed 'cheer' out of every pore. At some point she had taken the time out of her insanely busy schedule to make herself a tastefully form-fitting, burgundy Beacon Hills jersey. That, combined with the high pony tail tied off with a matching burgundy ribbon, gave her more school spirit than pretty much all of the student body combined. Hell, she had even drawn in some of those black stripes athletes sometimes have under their eyes.

"You realize you don't actually _go_ to my high school, right?" Charlie demanded as she slowly walked down the stairs. "Or have you had a Freaky Friday body swap with one of the incoming freshman. Wait, hold up!" She leaned over the railing, squinting at the woman. "Meredith Edwards, is that you?!"

"Hilarious, Charlie," Mel drawled out with a roll of the eyes. "Really, my sides are splitting." She turned to the mirror that was just inside the front door and pulled her shirt straight before readjusting her ponytail. "I just thought it would be a nice way to show my support for Robert."

Charlie let out a sigh and nodded. "And it is," she said, sliding down the railing the rest of the way down the stairs. "It really is." She snuck up behind her aunt and perched her chin on the woman's shoulder, so that the both of them were looking at the reflection. "And you look beautiful as always. Tell me, have you ever thought about just looking crappy for like one day? You know, just to mix it up and see how the other half lives?"

Mel closed her eyes and let out a whining noise. "You know I never have any idea how to respond when you say things like that," she muttered. "It makes me uncomfortable."

"I know!" Charlie chirped. "Now can you tell me why you want to leave so freaking early for the game?"

"I wanted to be there for warm-ups," Mel replied with a shrug as she perfected her lip gloss. "I figured that's the best way to see Robert in action."

At that suggestion, Charlie's eyes widened slightly. Finstock's tendency towards the loud, erratic and ridiculous usually seemed to increase the closer they got to the actual game. Mel was in for a pretty huge surprise when she got there. But then she saw something that made her question Mel's sanity as well. Right next to door was something she would never see in her own home. A rolled up poster. Charlie cringed inwardly as she picked the thing up and unrolled it. Spelled out in huge, capitalized, glittery letters was the phrase 'we love our coach'.

"What is this?" Charlie whispered, her brain refusing to believe what her eyes told her she was seeing.

"A poster," Mel said cheerily, turning away from the mirror to face Charlie. When she caught the horrified on Charlie's face, a wide grin split across Mel's face. "Oh my God, it's happened!" Mel said, clapping a hand over her mouth to fight back the gleeful giggles. "You're embarrassed to be seen with me!"

The expression on Charlie's face morphed from one of alarm to one of confusion. "And you're happy about this for some reason?"

"Absolutely I am!" Mel grinned. "You know what this means?"

"What does it mean?" Charlie sighed out, scratching at her forehead.

Mel grabbed Charlie's shoulders, making the girl face her directly. "It means I'm becoming a parent!"

Charlie snorted and raised her eyebrows at the woman. As aggressively normal as Mel seemed from the exterior, the woman certainly did have her quirks. "So you're saying that parenting skills are linked to your inherent ability to embarrass the child in question?"

"No," Mel said with a shake of the head. "But it is an indicator." She took the poster out of Charlie's hands and nodded approvingly at it before rolling it back up again. "I'll tell you what," she said, glancing over at Charlie. "Why don't we take separate cars to the game? That way you don't have to sit through the warm-up and you won't have to be associated with that _horrifically_ embarrassing woman who's cheering like a lunatic."

"You sure?" Charlie asked.

"Absolutely," Mel replied. "And anyways, Robert and I will probably go out for dinner after the game. I don't think you're quite ready to be joining us for that."

A wince appeared on Charlie's face and she slowly shook her head. "Yeah, no…..I'm not sure that's a party I want to RSVP 'yes' to at the moment."

Mel rolled up the poster and tucked it under her arm before stepping forwards and pressing a quick kiss to Charlie's forehead. "Alright. I'll see you later." Then she reached into her bag and pulled out an old, warn baseball cap. Unlike the jersey she was wearing, it was a navy blue. Or at least it had been at one point. Over time it had faded considerably, but the symbol for the New York Yankees still shone as proudly as ever. It was her dad's old hat. He would wear it to every game he took her to, and by the end of the first inning it always seemed to migrate its way to her head instead. Even when she was four years old and it was comically large. Smiling a little, Mel reached forwards and plopped the thing on Charlie's head. "Have fun at the game."

As Mel left Charlie didn't take the hat off, but pulled it more firmly onto her head. It was kind of like a security blanket. As long as it was on her head, nobody could get to her—not even Peter.

At first Charlie had been glad that Mel didn't insist that Charlie go with her to the game. Getting there early would have been a complete nightmare. She could picture the entire thing in her head. She would be virtually alone on the bleachers, staring longingly at the field, and then all of the sudden she and Stiles would make eye contact, it would become horribly awkward, and the she would do something horribly embarrassing like trip and face plant in the dirt. No. Waiting till this game started was much better. Then she could just be another face in the crowd—inconspicuous, invisible. Except for the fact that now she couldn't stop thinking about everything that as about to happen. She couldn't even retreat back into the numbing world of French verb conjugations.

Suddenly Charlie felt uncomfortable in her own skin. Those leather pants she had been wearing all day became tight and overly warm and that silk blouse made her skin itch. So she changed out of her awesome but wholly impractical leather pants and that beautiful top, trading them in for some reasonable, faded ripped jeans paired with a tank top and worn flannel over-shirt. Then she stood at the full length mirror that hung on the door to her closet and looked herself up and down. What she saw made her pause for a minute. With those clothes and that baseball cap on her head, she could swear she was looking at a picture of herself from last year, back before any of this had happened. And back before her dad died. Hell, she was pretty sure she wore that same outfit at the end of classes freshman year. There was one distinct difference, though. It was in the eyes. Stiles was right. She did look like she had seen a lot of dark stuff.

When the clock hit 5:38 pm, Charlie knew it was probably time to go. By the time she got there the crowd would be big enough for her to hide in and the first whistle would only be a few minutes off, meaning she could simultaneously be stealth-like and not miss a moment. And she didn't want to miss a moment. Not because she was particularly invested in lacrosse as a sport, but because she had this feeling something big was about to happen. And she had to be there to help stop it. So she climbed into her car and sped down the road in the direction of the school.

By the time Charlie pulled into the parking lot at Beacon Hills High, it was getting pretty full. Hell, it was probably even fuller. Athletics did always inspire more school spirit than academics, after all. After circling the lot a few times, she finally managed to spy a free spot and quickly pulled into it, bringing an immense amount of frustration to some soccer mom who was forced to search for yet another rare, open spot.

Letting out an anticipatory sigh, Charlie got out of her car, shoved her hands into her pockets, and trudged towards the field. She bowed her head slightly, focusing more on the path that her feet were taking her than on her destination itself. In that moment she remembered what wearing that hat had been like. It was almost like she was a horse wearing blinders. Wait, that sounded super-depressing. It wasn't just like that. It let her block out all that unnecessary stuff and focus on the important details. To her that used to mean ignoring all other people because, quite frankly, they were irrelevant to her. She would be moving in a few months—getting to know them was pointless anyway. But now it just meant she knew what the objective was. Usually that sort of focus was a good thing—it kept her on target—but it also meant she narrowed her vision.

"Hello, Ms. Oswin."

The iciness of the voice made Charlie freeze in place—and yes she was aware of the inherent pun in that phrase. She fought back a wince and slowly turned in the direction of the voice she wished she didn't recognize. As she suspected, she found herself face-to-face with Allison and her crazy-ass grandpa. Allison widened her eyes slightly in a silent request to 'be cool' and Charlie smiled widely, which roughly translated to 'as a cucumber'.

"Hey, Mr. Argent," Charlie said nodding at him and attempting to appear as clueless as possible. "Are you joining us for the game?"

He returned her nod with a creepy smile. "Well since there seemed to be so much enthusiasm within the student body, I figured that as your knew principal it was my obligation to find out what all the fuss was about. And as it meant more bonding time with my granddaughter here..." he wrapped an arm around Allison, pulling her into a hug "...how could I say no?"

Allison attempted a smile in return, but it just ended up looking pained. "Yeah," Allison said with an almost alarmingly cheerful smile. "Between my schoolwork and his actual work, we haven't really got time to get to know each other."

Charlie pursed her lips and nodded and understanding. "That's great," Charlie said, nodding. "Good for you." She nodded and looked between the two of them nodding uncomfortably. And then she clapped her hands together in a definitive manner. "Well….enjoy the game!"

Charlie began to walk off, but before she could get more than a few steps, Grandpa Argent's voice stopped her. "Why don't you join us?" he called out after her.

The pained wince on Charlie's face morphed into a slightly confused, but gracious smile as she turned back around to face the pair. "I'm sorry?" she asked with a questioning shrug.

"Join us for the game," Gerard said, inclining his head in the direction of the bleachers.

Charlie opened and closed her mouth a few times, unsure of how to respond. "Uh, that's not necessary," she drawled out. "I really don't want to interrupt the whole—" she waved her hand in their general direction "—the whole family bonding experience thing you've got going on with my snarky commentary and generally bad attitude."

Under normal circumstances somebody's semi-elderly grandparent would have made a face and begun slowly backing away while whispering at their grandchild to stay away from the crazy, rude girl. Gerard Argent? He let out a chuckle and smiled at her appreciatively. "Well," he said, glancing at Allison, "I've found that one of the best ways to get to know a person is by getting to know their friends." And then he turned back to Charlie with a knowing smirk. "Having read your file, Ms. Oswin, I am already well versed in your creativity, but I would love to become better acquainted with you as a person." He cocked his head to the side and studied her with those black, cold, shark-like eyes. "Tell me, now that we're out of school may I simply call you Charlie?"

"I'd rather you call me 'Your Highness'," Charlie shrugged back. Then Gerard smiled in response, though a more apt description would have been that he 'bared his teeth' in her general direction. "But Charlie's fine too," she barreled on, nodding uncomfortably.

"Well, I'll keep that in mind," he drawled out with that strange distinguished swagger he seemed to ooze effortlessly.

Charlie looked to Allison, trying to see if she had any ideas as to how this could be avoided. Having her around could have consequences on the plan. She wasn't sure what they might be, but any new variables added to the situation could have an unforeseen impact. But Allison didn't seem to have any clue how to avoid it either and before she knew what was going on, Charlie found herself being ushered towards the bleachers.

The three of them took their seats at the far edge of the bleachers, Allison and Gerard sitting next to each other with Charlie occupying the bench just above. The conversation seemed to stagnate there. It was like they were surrounded by a thick cloud of awkward, and that was not a good thing. As far as Gerard was concerned it was just a school game being casually watched by two good friends. There shouldn't be any awkwardness at all.

"So you looking forward to the game?" Allison asked brightly, looking up at Charlie and attempting some semblance of casual conversation.

"Uh, yeah," Charlie replied, bobbing her head along with her words and staring out at the fields as the players ran laps. And then her eyes strayed towards the edge of the field and the bench. A few feet off she saw a crazy blonde woman practically bouncing up and down on her feet. She let out a snort and shook her head. "Not as much as Mel is, though."

Allison furrowed her eyebrows in confusion. "What are you talking about?"

Charlie rolled her eyes a little and nodded back at the bench. Allison followed her gaze and let out a quiet 'oh' when she saw what Charlie was indicating at. Mel had graduated from the 'bouncing on the balls of her feet' bit to full on jumping. It was kind of adorable, but the adorable didn't mean it wasn't also vaguely disturbing. "I'm pretty sure she's going to tire herself out before the game even starts," Charlie mused under her breath.

Allison covered her mouth, forcing the guffawing laugh that was trying to fight its way out into a dignified chuckle. "I think it's cute," she muttered back. "And oh, look, she's got a poster." Allison twisted around in her seat and smirked up at Charlie. "Are you sure the two of you are actually related?"

Charlie let out a low whine and pulled her cap further down on her head, trying to hide her face. "That's what she keeps telling me," she mumbled back. "I don't think she had any reason to lie." Then she saw Mel lift her fingers to her lips and she let out a loud wolf-whistle whilst simultaneously pumping a fist in the air. The display made her scrunch her face up in an expression of confusion and alarm. "But then again, maybe I should get some DNA samples and get them tested. Just to be sure."

"Ah, that's right," Grandpa Argent said, nodding sagely. "Your aunt and Coach Finstock have become an item." Charlie's head snapped to look at him. Noticing her concern he let out a small 'ah' and nodded. "Mr. Finstock came to me when the relationship began. I like to know when there's a potential conflict of interest between students and faculty members."

"Right," Charlie bit out carefully. "That makes sense. I guess."

Luckily for her the whistle signifying the beginning of the game soon went off, sparing Charlie any further thoughts about Grandpa Argent investigating her personal life. All of the players jogged onto the field, adopting their positions. Except for one that is. Stiles made his way back to his usual spot on the bench. Charlie found herself staring at the back of his head, wondering what he was thinking about. The game? Finding the bestiary? Could he maybe, possibly be thinking about her? Did she want him to be thinking about her?

CRUNCH!

The sound of bodies colliding made Charlie jump in her seat. She had been so focused on creepily staring at the back of Stiles's head that she hadn't noticed anything about how the game was going. The answer? Not well.

The game was barely seven minutes in and the other team already had an upper hand. A big one. A huge one. A freaking Goliath. And that upper hand was apparently named Eddie Abomawitz. The guy was built like an SUV and apparently had no problems with 'vehicular homicide'. He seemed to be picking off the Beacon Hills players one by one, sending them off on stretchers. The next victim was Aaron Harrison. He let out a pathetic wheezing 'oomph' when he got hit, making Charlie wince sympathetically.

Those first seven minutes pretty much set the tone for the entire game. Beacon Hills was going to be destroyed. Every so soften there would be a sickening crack, a collective flinch from the crowd on the bleachers, and a wave of concerned murmuring. For once Charlie found herself grateful that Stiles was the team's token bench warmer. Him sitting on the sidelines meant he wasn't out there waiting to have his head ripped off by some enormous teenager who had definitely had some 'Hulk' genes spliced into his DNA. But by the time they reached the fourth quarter they were running out of players. And they were running out of time.

Somewhere in all the chaos, Charlie noticed Stiles pop his head up and look searchingly in the direction of the bleachers. He was looking for Allison. It was time for their plan to take effect—he was giving the sign. Charlie pulled her cap lower on her head and retreated in a little bit to avoid detection and nudged Allison with the toe of her boot, prompting her to notice Stiles's indication. The girl gave a single, almost imperceptible nod of the head and Stiles got up from the bench, looking left and right before 'sneakily' dodging through the crowds towards them.

"I knew I should have worn a warmer jacket," Allison whispered, rubbing at her shoulders.

"You're cold!" Grandpa Argent exclaimed, standing up in his seat. "Oh, here. Take my coat."

"You sure?" Allison asked quietly.

"Of course."

Allison stood up as well, allowing Gerard to slide his coat on over her shoulders and smiling gratefully. "Thank you."

Gerard waved his hand dismissively and turned back to the game. Allison on the other hand began subtly checking the pockets of the jacket. When she found the set of keys she covered them with her palm, hiding them from sight.

"Good God," Grandpa Argent said, watching yet another collision on the field. "Is it always this violent?"

Allison glanced up at Charlie with a slightly pleading look on her face. The drop-off was about to go down and it would be helpful if her grandfather was distracted. Well if there was one things that was distracting, it was Charlie's ability to drone on about her entirely unsubstantiated theories in life in general. "I'm actually surprised most lacrosse games aren't this violent," she mused to herself.

"Really?" Mr. Argent said, glancing up at her and away from Allison. "And why do you figure that?"

Charlie blew out a long breath and jerked her head to the side noncommittally. "Well from an anthropological perspective, you could say that sports games serve as a substitute for battle and war. The whole thing is a dominance display really—seeing who can beat who, which player would be the better warrior. It's the one place where aggression in sanctioned. Hell, it's even encouraged. As long as you beat the crap out of someone while kind of adhering to the rules set in place, there's no stigma against it. People will jump up and down and cheer for you."

Charlie's eyes scanned the crowd, looking for Stiles. He was making his approach.

"That's an interesting perspective," Grandpa Argent said, still looking up at her. "Not one I would have expected from teenage girl."

Charlie just made a face and shrugged. "Well think about it for a second. What are the two figures are so often portrayed as the quintessential American. There's the quarterback and the soldier. I'm not saying the one equals the other, but I feel like sometimes they're talked about in the same context."

And then the man smiled at her. It was an appreciative smile, but the way the lights of the lacrosse pitch glinted off his scarily white teeth made it oddly sinister. Luckily, a shrill whistle blew, attracting his attention back to the field. Charlie, however, looked to make sure Stiles had gotten away with the keys. She didn't have to look far though.

As she glanced to her right, she found Stiles standing still and looking up at her. He had finally spotted her. When they made eye contact Charlie froze in place, her hands instinctively gripped the cold metal of the bleachers she was sitting on. Stiles opened his mouth slightly, like he wanted to say something, but then his eyes flickered from her to the white-haired man sitting literally inches from her. He couldn't say anything-not then at least. So he snapped his mouth shut, his jaw twitching slightly as he gave her one last long look before making his way off the field.

Charlie wrapped her arms around her waist and let out a shaky breath, suddenly feeling really cold herself. Except the chill had nothing to do with the weather. Instead she chose to focus on the game. They were losing players, and fast.

"Stilinski!" the coach's voice echoed over the crowd as he paced back and forth over at the line of the field. "Has anybody seen Stilinski?! Where's Stilinski?!"

Crap. Crap, crap, crap. This was Stiles's second chance to actually play in a game and, once again, he had missed it.

"Come on!" Coach shouted, desperately looking around like some extra player was about to poof into existence. Until apparently one did. "YOU!" he exclaimed, pointing at the crowd. "Do you play lacrosse?"

Charlie followed his line of vision, and when she saw who Finstock was pointing at, her stomach plummeted. Boyd. And who was Boyd sitting next to? Erica. That pretty much spelled out the situation for her. Out of all of the people in the bleachers he had settled on a newly turned werewolf who had yet to face his first full moon. Well this was very much not good. After a few moments consideration, Boyd got to his feet and dramatically stripped off his jacket, standing there like a giant pillar of muscle and brute force. Finstock started laughing manically and did a little jig. "We got ourselves a player!"

Boyd getting on the field seemed to turn the tide of the game to a certain extent. For once the cheers were actually coming from the Beacon Hills portion of the crowd. But honestly Charlie wasn't paying attention to the game at all. Her eyes stayed fixed on that giant countdown clock with its angry, blinking red letters. That number kept going down, getting closer and closer to zero, and Stiles still wasn't back yet. After the game they would have fifteen minutes top to get those keys back to Allison without Gerard noticing they were gone. They were running out of time, and Stiles needed help.

Coming to a decision, Charlie stood to her feet. "Excuse me. I have to use the bathroom."

"Wha—now?" Allison asked in confusion.

"The game's almost over," Grandpa Argent piled on, looking up at her. "You're going to miss the ending."

Charlie shrugged and hopped over the railing lining the bleachers. "When you've got to go, you've got to go. If I hold it in any longer I think my bladder with literally explode. Allison will tell me what happened. Won't you, Allison?"

Allison blinked and nodded. "Uh, yeah. Yeah, of course."

"Okay then."

Without another word Charlie took off, following Stiles's path off the field and towards the school. She could feel her nerves jangling each time her feet hit the pavement, but this was a hell of a lot bigger than her own insecurities. She was just winding her way through the cars in the parking lot when something in the distance made her stop. Lydia was sitting in her Beetle, sniffling and wiping at her eyes. When she saw her friend, Charlie skidded to a halt, her sneakers squeaking against the asphalt. In that moment she felt like she was being ripped in two different directions, towards Lydia and towards the school. She stood still for a moment, both obligations battling inside her. But then she swore under her breath and made her way towards the car. She couldn't leave Lydia crying without even trying to find out what was wrong.

"Lydia?" she asked quietly as she approached the car window. "Lydia, are you okay?"

Lydia jumped in her seat before looking up at Charlie and rolling her eyes. "Are you kidding me?" she demanded, wiping at her eyes to try to cover up the fact that she was crying.

"What happened?" Charlie pressed, looking at her seriously. "What's wrong?"

"Nothing's happened and nothing's wrong," Lydia insisted. "I'm fine."

"You are not fine," Charlie insisted. "Look at you—you are not fine."

Charlie let out a scoff and wiped under her eyes. "Is there a freaking beacon in the sky that's telling people to come gawk at the vulnerable, crying girl? Why is everybody showing up now while I'm a blubbering mess? I don't want anybody to see me crying."

Charlie furrowed her eyebrows in confusion. "What do you mean 'everybody'?" she whispered.

Lydia let out a scoff and shook her head. "Stiles was here earlier," she said, waving her hand dismissively. At that Charlie pressed her lips together in a thin line and nodded. That would explain why things were taking a bit longer than usual. Stiles had seen Lydia crying. Of course he would stop and try to make her feel better.

"Stiles was here," Charlie repeated, nodding to herself.

"And—and he was being all nice and considerate too," she continued, wiping at her eyes. "That is until he ditched me here. He said he would be back in five minutes and that was….sixteen minutes ago. Honestly, Charlie, I'm not sure what you see in him. Other than the nice and considerate bit."

At that point, Charlie was even more torn. Lydia was allowing herself to be vulnerable, which was something that almost never happened. But Stiles not sticking to his word, especially when it came to Lydia, sent up all sorts of red flags. Something wasn't right. Charlie glanced in the direction of the school doors and suddenly felt like she was kicked in the gut. Wandering into the school with as much swagger as possible were Derek and Erica. Her eyes fell shut and her jaw twitched violently as she forced back the stream of curses threatening to fly out of her mouth. Why did the timing always have to be so epically shitty?

When Charlie opened her eyes again, Lydia was looking at her accusatorily. She could tell that Charlie's attention wasn't quite focused on her. Letting out a scoff, she twisted the keys in the ignition and made the car roar to life. "I'm just going to go home," she muttered bitterly. "I'll see you tomorrow."

"Lydia, wait!"

Then Lydia lingered in the parking spot for a moment, looking up at Charlie expectantly. Like Charlie was on trial. Charlie let out a shaky breath and glanced at the school one more time. "Look," Charlie whispered, leaning on the windowsill of the car. "It's been a while since we talked. And I mean actually talked. No interruptions or distractions or anything like that. This weekend let's carve out some time that's just for us, okay? I need some time with my best friend."

The earnestness of Charlie's plea made Lydia's anger waver slightly. She looked Charlie up and down and pressed her lips together in a thin line and nodded. "Okay, fine," she drawled out with a roll of her eyes. "Don't be so clingy. It's an unattractive quality in a person." She grabbed Charlie's hand where it rested on the windowsill and gave it a quick squeeze before backing out of the parking spot. Charlie reluctantly watched her go, waving a bit as she pulled away, both figuratively and literally. Shit. She just kept screwing everything up.

Sucking in a deep breath, Charlie ran towards the front door, colliding with it as she forced her way through. She sprinted down the hallways in the direction of the principal's office. When she did she found the door ajar with a set of keys and a flash drive dangling from the lock. Charlie's eyes roved around the office, looking for some indication of where Stiles might be, but he was gone. Swearing loudly, she kicked at the wall giving rise to a loud thump that echoed down the hall. But then she heard something else. The sound of muffled cries. Charlie froze for a moment, staying completely quiet and trying to pinpoint the source of the noise.

It was coming from the direction of the pool.

Immediately, Charlie started running in the direction of the noise. When she shoved open the door leading to the pool, she found Stiles standing there awkwardly being faced down by Derek and Erica. At the sound of the door opening, all heads turned to face in her direction. Stiles's eyes went wide with panic, Erica sneered, and Derek just raised his eyebrows, not looking particularly surprised at all by her sudden appearance.

"Oh my God!" Erica groaned, glowering at her. "Why are you everywhere all the time?!"

"Ch—Charlie, what are you doing here?" Stiles stammered out, frantically glancing between her and Derek.

Charlie sent a fleeting glance in Stiles's direction, but couldn't maintain eye contact for long without that self-conscious flush creeping up her neck. "When you didn't come back from the office I figured you got into trouble and might need a hand," she whispered back. "I should have known 'trouble' had an affection for brooding and leather jackets that were just slightly too tight." She narrowed her eyes at Derek. "What the hell do you think you're doing?"

Derek let out a low chuckle and folded his arms, squaring his shoulders in her direction. "I don't know if it's escaped your notice, Charlie, but there's a creature running around town killing people. Isaac's dad for one. Now I won't be able to properly defend myself and my pack if I don't know what it is. Stiles here—" he gestured at Stiles "—has seen the creature. He knows what we need to look out for. I'm just trying to protect my people."

"Oh, yeah," Charlie drawled out sarcastically. "You're great at looking after your betas. That's why, as we speak, Boyd is running around on a lacrosse field—adrenaline pumping through his veins, aggression building up—while the crazy broadsword-wielding hunter is sitting in the second row of the bleachers. That's some top-notch parenting, Papa Wolf."

Charlie could practically hear the sound of teeth grinding as Derek looked over at Erica. "Is that true?"

"Yeah," Erica admitted reluctantly. "Yeah, it's true." And then she looked at Charlie with an expression of such intense hatred, Charlie was fairly sure she was about to spontaneously combust. Charlie was left feeling very much like the kid who tattled on the other kid who had just peed in the pool.

"O—okay," Stiles said, stepping forwards so that he was slightly in front of her. "So what you're saying is that if I tell you what I saw, you'll just let us go?"

Derek stared at them with that expression that looked like he was sucking on lemons but nodded in agreement. "Yeah. Sure."

Letting out a loud sigh, Stiles looked back at her for a long moment before turning back to Derek. "Alright, the thing…was pretty slick looking. Um, the skin was dark—kind of patterned. Uh….I think I actually saw scales." He shrugged his shoulders in frustration, letting his arms collapse back to his sides. "Is that enough?" he demanded. "Because I have—" he glanced back at Charlie "—I have somebody I really need to talk to."

Derek stood there silently, which Stiles apparently interpreted as a 'no' because he groaned in frustration and barreled on. "Okay, eye. Eyes are, uh, yellowish. And slitted. Um, it has a lot of teeth. Oh, and it's got a tail too. Are we good?"

As Stiles spoke, Charlie noticed both Derek and Erica slowly start to look upwards. Frowning to herself, she followed their gazes as Stiles continued to speak. And then she saw it. Right there on the balcony above their heads was a creature pretty much identical to what Stiles had been describing. Only he had forgotten to mention the almost translucent claws that she saw gripping the railing. One thing was for sure. It wasn't a freaking ninja turtle.

"What?" Stiles demanded, still completely oblivious to the danger they were in. "Wait—have you seen it? You have this look on your faces like you know exactly what I'm talking about!"

Charlie instinctively and almost involuntarily drew closed to Stiles. She tugged on the sleeve of his jacket, making him whip around to face her, surprised at her sudden proximity. He studied her face in confusion, taking note of her panicked expression. "Charlie, what is it?" he whispered urgently.

"Stiles." She said his name so quietly she could barely hear it herself. She tilted her head upwards, making him look in the same direction. The lizard monster thing—whatever the hell it was—was now perched atop the railing, ready to pounce. It stared down at the lot of them with an oddly curious expression, and let out a violent hiss.

"H—holy sh—"

Stiles grabbed hold of Charlie's hand and backed away from the balcony, dragging her with him. Barely a moment later the thing jumped down, landing almost exactly where they were standing. Not wasting a second it swiped at Erica, sending her flying. She collided with one of the tiles walls surrounding the pool and crumpled to the ground completely unconscious. Immediately the thing rounded back on the rest of them. Derek wheeled around and planted a hand on hers and Stiles's shoulders, shoving them back a bit. "Run!"

Stiles and Charlie both made a move to sprint out of there as fast as humanly possible, but out of the corner of her eye Charlie saw the creature slash at Derek with its claws, just barely grazing the back of his neck.

"Derek, your neck!" Stiles exclaimed, having apparently seen the same thing.

Then something strange happened. The creature began backing away. For a split second Charlie deluded herself into thinking that they might possibly be safe, but that hope was wiped away when Derek's knees began to buckle under his own weight. Right. The thing oozed some sort of paralytic goo. It didn't have to attack. It just had to wait for the venom to take effect. Not the most sportsman-like of maneuvers, but you really couldn't argue with the results.

Immediately Charlie and Stiles both darted forwards, each of them grabbing one of Derek's arms in a feeble attempt to half-walk half-drag him past the pool and to safety. It wasn't an easy feat. Derek was freaking heavy. Charlie could hear the blood pounding in her ears and feel her heart racing in her chest as they tried to stagger away. "Wh—where is it?" Stiles panted out. "Do you see it?"

Charlie glanced around frantically until her eyes fell on the other side of the pool. The thing was staying put, waiting for them to tire themselves out before attacking. "O—Over there," she breathed out, nodding in its direction.

"Call Scott," Derek ordered.

Charlie patted at her pockets, searching for her phone, but they were all empty. "Crap!" she shouted. "I left my phone in the car."

"Seriously?!"

"Well I wasn't exactly expecting to be in this position, was I?!"

"Hold on," Stiles mumbled. "I got it."

He reached for his pockets to get his phone, but as he fumbled with it, the thing clattered to the ground. He leaned down to pick it up, but in the process virtually all of Derek's mass was shifted onto Charlie. Unprepared for all the dead weight, she felt her knees buckle slightly and she tilted to the side. "Stiles!"

The whole thing felt like it was happening in slow motion. At first she just teetered slightly along the edge of the pool, but then Derek's careening figure gained momentum. She tried to force herself back into an upright position, but gravity was not working in her favor. Before she could do anything she felt herself crashing into the water, her skin stinging with the force of impact.

At first Charlie didn't know what to do. Derek's limp, useless body was on top of her, pushing her further down into the water. He just had to be like 1% body fat, and all that muscle had him sinking in the water like he was a chunk of iron. The panic Charlie was feeling had her lungs screaming for air. Finally she managed to shove him away and get out from under him, but she still had to drag him back to the top. She looped an arm under his and struggled to haul him upwards, her muscles crying out for oxygen the entire time. She gritted her teeth and managed to haul him a few feet from the bottom, the last bit of air in her lungs escaping her mouth in bubbles.

The sounds of a muffled splash made Charlie look back at the surface of the water. A burgundy-colored blur had broken the surface of the water and was headed straight for them. If she could have, Charlie would have breathed a sigh of relief when Stiles appeared, grabbing Derek's other arm. Between the two of them they managed to get Derek to the surface, taking big, gulping breaths as their faces met the air.

"Wh—where did it go?" Stiles panted out as soon as he had caught his breath. "Where is it? Do—do you see it?"

"No," Derek replied, looking around. "I don't."

"M—maybe it just took off?" Stiles posited hopefully. Then, as if on cue, a bone-chilling shriek echoed against the walls of the room.

"Or then again, maybe not," Charlie muttered, still looking around for any sign of the creature.

The three of them stayed quiet for a while, looking for any other signs that the creature was hanging around. There weren't any. From all indications it looked like the area was completely quiet and completely empty. Except, that is, for the sound of their exhausted breaths. "Can you guys get me out of here before I drown?" Derek asked harshly.

"Y—you're worried s about drowning?" Stiles spluttered. "Did you notice the thing out there with multiple rows of razor-sharp teeth?"

"Did you notice I'm paralyzed from the neck down in eight feet of water?!" Derek shouted back.

"Okay," Charlie snapped, still treading water and doing her best to keep both her and Derek afloat. "How's about we stow the snark and try to be constructive here? It's not like we've got a ton of options at the moment." She looked around one more time for any sign of the creature. "Does anybody see anything? Maybe we could just make a break for it."

Stiles glanced around and shook his head. "I don't see it."

The two of them started paddling feebly towards the edge of the pool with their one available arm. They got to within a few feet of the pool's edge when all of the sudden Derek's voice stopped them. "Wait, wait, wait! Stop! Stop!"

They saw the shadow first, the tail whipping around menacingly. It magnified the creature's size by about five times as it stalked around the pool. She forced her eyes to refocus of the figure of the lizard itself. While it was much smaller, it was infinitely more terrifying. The think looked directly at them and hissed before continuing its pacing.

"Wh—what's it waiting for?" Stiles asked haltingly.

Charlie opened her mouth to speak, but it filled with that acrid, chlorinated water. She spat it out before she managed to force out the words. "Maybe…maybe it's taunting us or something. Maybe it likes to play with its food before it eats it."

Water splashed as Stiles's head snapped around to glare at her. "Thanks for that Charlie!" he exclaimed. "Really, that was very helpful! Now I'm not freaking out at all!"

"Would the two of you just shut up?" Derek groaned loudly.

And they did. Neither of them had the breath to keep talking. The creature stopped pacing and it approached the pool itself. Charlie felt her heart begin to pound even harder in her chest. This was it. This was the moment where it jumped in the water and killed them all. It would be like that scene from 'Jaws' where a person gets yanked under the water and then the water turns red with blood.

Except that didn't happen. The creature reached out a clawed hand, but as soon as it made contact with the water it jerked it back, like a person touching a hot stove. "Wait—did see you that?" Stiles asked. "I don't think it can swim."

"No," Charlie replied, shaking her head. "It's more than that. It—it looks like it's afraid of the water."

"So….what?" Stiles asked breathlessly. "We just keep swimming until it gets bored and decides to leave?"

"Yeah," Charlie muttered. "That seems about right."

"Well that's just fan-freaking-tastic," Stiles mumbled back.

The creature continued to pace and pace around the pool like it was taunting them—mocking them. And all they could do was wait. Charlie kicked off her shoes and her socks, letting them fall to the bottom of the pool as she kicked. For the longest time, none of them talked. They couldn't. They didn't have enough energy for that. Every ounce of their concentration was geared towards keeping themselves and each other alive. Five minutes turned into fifteen, turned into an hour, turned into an hour and a half, and they were still there treading water.

"I'm not sure I can keep this up for much longer," Charlie whispered.

"Yeah," Stiles agreed, nodding in agreement. "Sorry, buddy, but we don't have super-strength and you are really freaking heavy."

Charlie let out a shaky breath and looked over at Derek, whose face was right next to hers. "So," she prompted. "Now that you've seen the thing, any ideas what it is? Because if you can come up with a way to kill it or maim it or distract it and get the hell out of here, I'm all ears."

Derek ground his teeth together. "No. I don't know what it is."

"Well that's just fantastic, then," Charlie said snappishly. "How about in the future we try to establish a line of communication before randomly confronting each other? That way we don't go cornering each other at swimming pools and don't end up in situations like this one. We can have weekly meetings on Thursdays where we exchange notes on all things supernatural. How does that sound?"

Derek didn't reply, but she did hear the sound of a watery snort come from Stiles's direction. She looked over at him through furrowed eyebrows and when he saw her expression he gave an only semi-apologetic shrug. "Sorry," he mumbled. "It's just—it's a little ironic for you to be commenting on communication skills. I mean it's not exactly like you're a 'share-er'. You go to pretty big lengths to avoid sharing."

Charlie blinked at him in shock and confusion. "Stiles, we're being circled by an as-yet unknown hell-beast. Do you really think this is the right time to start talking about this?"

"No," Stiles shot back. "But when exactly will we be talking about this? You've been avoiding me all day. When exactly am I going to be able to catch you alone? As far as I know this is my only freaking chance."

"Do I have to remind you that you're not alone?" Derek growled from his spot between them.

"Look," Stiles continued, ignoring Derek. "I know that the conversation is going to be weird, but if we don't have it at all, it's just going to get weirder until we're never going to be able to talk to each other at all! I don't want that. Do you?"

"Of course I don't!" she hissed back. "That's pretty much the last thing I want. But this isn't exactly an appropriate time, is it?"

"Well when will be the appropriate time?! Two weeks after never?"

A loud groan issued forth from the figure the two of them were propping up. "Would the two of you just stop talking? She'll tell you what's going on with her when she's ready. Until then, some silence and concentration on KEEPING US ALIVE would be nice."

And then Stiles was quiet. But that didn't allow Charlie to relax at all. In fact, it made her much, much more tense. She could see the gears turning behind Stiles's eyes. He was taking all the clues and bits of information and adding them together before he came to his conclusion. "DEREK?!" he shouted. "There's something going on with you, and you went to Derek?! Seriously?!"

That all-too-familiar wave of guilt crashed into Charlie. It must have been written all over her face, because Stiles's frustration and anger seemed to double in the space of like three seconds. "You know what?!" he spluttered. "No. Just no. I can understand why you wouldn't want to talk about what's going on with you. Hell, I can even understand why you bolted after we kissed, but this—?! Why would you—? I mean how could you—? DEREK?! It was one thing when you weren't talking to anybody about anything, but this? It's just a whole new level of—of I don't know what!"

"Just let me go," Derek muttered bitterly, shaking his head. "Just let me sink to the bottom of the pool and drown."

But once again, he was just an afterthought. Charlie was too focused on that look of pained accusation in Stiles's eyes. And that familiar impulse washed over her again. The need to run. The need to get as far away from there as quickly as possible. But none of that would be possible while she was stuck in the damn pool. She ground her teeth together as she came to her decision. "Screw this waiting thing. I'm calling Scott."

Stiles seemed confused for about half a second before he realized what she was saying. "Wha—Charlie! You can't! The phone's too far from the edge of the pool!"

But Charlie ignored him. She looked around for the creature. It was on the far side of the pool, a lot of space between it and the phone. Okay. It was now or never.

Charlie released Derek and swam towards the phone as quickly as possible. Each stroke was agony, but she did her best to ignore the screaming ache of her muscles. She could hear Stiles struggling a bit under the increase in the weight he had to support and calling for her to come back, but she forced herself not to listen. This was their one chance.

When Charlie hit the wall of the pool, she looked up to see the location of the creature. It was still a ways off, but had noticed her mad dash to the wall and was quickly headed in her direction. Swearing under her breath, she shoved herself out of the pool and grabbed at the phone, fumbling with it a bit. As soon as she was totally out of the water, she creature shot towards her at an impossible speed. She stumbled backwards practically doing a back flip into the water in her attempt to get away, all the while holding her right arm high in the air to keep the phone from getting wet.

Charlie planted her feet against the wall and shoved backwards towards the center of the pool and away from the creature. It swiped at her, its claws missing her face by just a few inches. She breathed a sigh of relief and gave a tiny, victorious laugh before looking over at Stiles and Derek. She gave a tiny nod to indicate that she was okay, and the expression of panic on his face leaked away. She quickly punched in Scott's number and pressed the phone to her ear as it rang. "Please pick up," she chanted under her breath. "Please pick up. Please pick up."

"Hello?" Scott's voice whispered on the other end.

"Hey, Scott!" she said with relief. "It's Charlie. We need hel—"

"I can't talk right now!" Scott hissed back before she could get the sentence out. And then she heard a loud click. Charlie stared down at the phone for a moment in disbelief. "He just hung up on me," she growled. "He freaking hung up on me!"

"Well call him back!" Derek shouted.

"Thanks Derek," she shot back. "That thought had never occurred to me!"

She punched in the number again and waited for the ring. But the ring never came. It went straight to voicemail. Letting out small scream of frustration, Charlie chucked the phone aside and swam back towards the other two.

"What the hell was that?" Stiles demanded. "Th—that was our shot to—"

"Scott turned off his phone," she replied. "I don't know why."

Swimming back next to the two boys, Charlie grabbed Derek's free arm and dragged it over her shoulders, taking some of the weight off Stiles. She didn't know what to do anymore. That was her last play. All they could do was wait for Derek's limbs to start working again and who knew when that would happen.

"Hey," Stiles's voice interjected, breaking her morbid reverie. She looked up at him to find his eyes filled with assurance, all trace of his previous anger completely gone. That was the weird thing about Stiles. He could just….let things go. "We're going to make it through this, okay?"

"Yeah," Charlie agreed with as much conviction as possible. "Of course we are."

But after the next few minutes, it really didn't feel like they were going to make it. There was only so much physical exertion Charlie could withstand, and she was beginning to reach that point. The kicking of her legs was getting slower. She would even allow her head to submerge in the water a full fifteen seconds at a time just so that she could get a little bit of a break. But then she would lose her breath and everything would get so much worse.

"Stiles," she whispered, defeat edging into her voice. "I don't think I can keep this up much longer."

"Me neither," he whispered back, sounding just as exhausted as she was. "We need something to hold onto." They both looked around the pool until Stiles jerked his head in the direction of the diving boards, each of which were equipped with a hand-hold. "Over there. The handles."

Charlie nodded in agreement and the two of them desperately paddled towards them. Honestly the handles were too close to the edge—the creature would probably be able to get at them there—but the exhaustion was too much. Charlie didn't want to drown. When they made it to the edge they grappled for the hand-holds, but they were just out of reach. Derek's body was weighing them down too much. Charlie made one last desperate grab, but her fingers slipped against the smooth plastic, sending her plunging under the water again. She tried to make her legs move—she tried to kick—but her muscles refused. It was like her mind and her body weren't connected any more. No matter how much she told herself to move—to fight—she just couldn't. She felt herself sinking deeper and deeper into the water, unable to do anything about it. Her eyes were open under the water, and she could see Stiles there with her, slowly sinking down, and she felt her insides go cold. This was it. It was all over.

All of the sudden, when she was just about to give up the last, tiniest shred of hope, she felt something grab her. She was yanked out of the water and sent flying through the air, collapsing into a heap on top of another figure. Charlie hacked violently, squeezing her eyes shut and forcing all the excess water out of her lungs. When she finally managed to open her eyes, she saw that the person she had landed on was Stiles. On instinct she grabbed his face in her hands and turned it towards her, inspecting every feature, every detail to assure herself that he was alright. When she finally allowed herself to be certain she let out a single sob of relief and collapsed again, her head landing on his chest. "Hey, what did I tell you?" she heard his voice whisper in her ear as an arm wrapped around her, pulling her in close. "I told you we'd be okay."

But his words came too soon. Another unearthly shriek ripped through the pool, causing Stiles and Charlie to jump apart. It was only then that she realized what unseen force had rescued her from a watery grave in her school swimming pool. Scott was crouching there in all his wolfed-out glory, facing off with the lizard creature. He roared loudly at the thing, but it didn't appear all that intimidated. Its tail darted forwards and wrapped around his ankle, sending him flying into a nearby mirror. Scott recovered almost immediately and grabbed a shard of the mirror, holding it out as a weapon as the creature made its approach.

Charlie felt panic clawing at her throat again, but then something strange happened. The creature just stopped and stared, not at Scott but at the shard of mirror he was holding in his hand. It cocked its head to the side and looked at its own reflection with something resembling curiosity of even confusion. And then it just ran, bounding through the pool until through some miracle of physics it managed to crash through the skylight in the roof.

For a few moments the four of them just sat there, completely silent. Well if someone had to be the first to speak after that healthy helping of drama, it might as well be her. Charlie took another deep breath and nodded in Scott's direction.

"Scott, if you ever screen my calls again, I'm going to freaking kill you."

He swallowed heavily and nodded in understanding. "Noted."

After that, Charlie felt like she was in a bit of the haze. Maybe it was the exhaustion or the oxygen deprivation, but she just felt….slow. Like when you wake up at the wrong point in your sleep cycle and your body knows that it's not supposed to be around and moving. But she forced herself to move. There were still things that needed resolving. One in particular.

Scott explained to her and Stiles exactly why he had decided to get off his werewolf ass and come and save them. Turns out the bestiary wasn't actually a book. No, that would have been way, way too easy for them. It was the flash drive that Gerard kept on his key ring. Not wasting any time, the propped up a laptop on the hood of Scott's mom's car and began plugged the thing in, flipping through the images that had been saved on the drive. Those images were all pages out of what was probably the thick, leather-bound book that had been initially described, complete with medieval drawings and insane calligraphy. And, oh yeah, they were written in a dead language.

"What the hell is th—Is that even a language?" Stiles demanded, gesturing at the screen.

Charlie squinted at the text and leaned in a little closer, her shoulder brushing against Stiles's as she moved. "It looks like Archaic Latin," she mused under her breath. Stiles and Scott both turned to look at her, expectant looks on both of their faces. "I can't read it or anything," she said, throwing her hands in the air. "I just know what it looks like. And it looks like there's hundreds of pages of the stuff. It's going to take weeks for us to sift through. Maybe longer."

Scott sighed heavily and looked back at the screen. "Well then how the hell are we going to figure out what this thing is?" he groaned on frustration.

"It's called a kanima," Derek's voice interrupted. Scott, Stiles, and Charlie all looked up to see the new alpha approaching them, Erica and tow.

"Oh would you look at that," Charlie said bitterly, raising her eyebrows at the blonde. "Look who decided to rejoin the frigging party."

"A kanima?" Stiles growled, glowering at Derek. "You knew the whole time?"

"No," Derek said with a single shake of the head. "Only when it was confused by its own reflection."

Scott furrowed his eyebrows in thought. "It doesn't know what it is," he asserted.

"Or who," Derek replied, nodding in agreement.

"Well what else do you know?" Stiles demanded, glaring angrily at Derek. Stiles didn't particularly like Derek, but he seemed to exhibiting even more hostility than usual. Charlie couldn't help but think that maybe it had a little something to do with his discovery—that she had asked him for help rather than…..others. Whether or not Derek noticed the uptick in tension, Charlie really couldn't tell. He just continued on naturally. "Only stories," he replied with a shrug. "Rumors."

"But—but it's like us?" Scott asked.

Derek made a face and bobbed his head in tentative agreement. "A shape-shifter, yes. But it's…it's not right. It's like a…."

"An abomination," Stiles finished for him. Derek just nodded again in response.

"Okay, let me get this straight," Charlie said, throwing her hands in the air. "So this….this kanima is a shapeshifter—like werewolves but even deadlier—and….and it has no sense of its own identity? That's—that's not good. That means it has no reason, it has no motivation, no goals. It has no hopes, dreams, or aspirations. So you're saying what? That it's just killing for the hell of it? Because it can?"

"No," Derek replied simply. "It's killing because that's what it was built to do."

"Great," Stiles bit out, rocking back on his heels and rolling his eyes. "That's just fantastic news."

"But it's a person," Charlie elaborated, still facing down Derek. "That—that thing is a person. Who has no idea what they're doing when they turn. Or that they're turning at all."

"Yeah, Charlie," Derek shot back, his frustration mounting. "That's the basic idea."

With that, Derek and Erica both turned and began walking away. That is until Scott's voice made them stop.

"Derek!"

Slowly the two other wolves turned back around to face him. "We need to work together on this," Scott insisted. "Maybe even tell the Argents."

"You trust them?!" Derek demanded, his eyes spitting fire.

And then in Scott's face changed. There was a sort of urgent determination in his face that Charlie didn't recognize. "Nobody trusts anyone!" he shot back, enunciating the words carefully. "That's the problem! While we're here arguing about who's on what side there's something scarier, stronger, and faster than of us, and it's killing people! And we still don't even know anything about it!"

Derek's jaw twitched violently and steely resolve built up behind his eyes. "I know one thing," he growled. "When I find it, I'm gonna kill it."

With that, Derek stalked off into the night, Erica silently following in his wake. Amidst all of the uncertainty that swirled around them these days, one thing was for sure. That guy was definitely a fan of the dramatic exit. Charlie watched him through narrowed eyes as he went. Derek might not be one of the bad guys, but he definitely wasn't one of the good guys either. Scott was the good guy. Scott was the one who always tried to save everyone, even if it was harder or hurt more. Which was why, out of all the possible sides, she was choosing his. His and Stiles's.

Derek was right about one thing, though. Something had to be done. Just not tonight.

As the others disappeared beyond the lights of the parking lot, Stiles let out a loud scoff and shook his head. "Well what now?"

"Well I don't know about you," Charlie drawled out, "but I'm going to change into some dry clothes, get in my car, go home, and go to sleep."

She didn't wait for any response before walking in the direction of the girl's locker room. If she knew anything about Stiles and Scott, it was that after a night like tonight they needed a little bit of time alone. They needed to plan, they needed to discuss, they needed to talk each other through the massive piles of shit they were all being forced to wade through. As much as she had become a part of it the past couple of months, all of this stuff still boiled down to the two of them. It had started out as the Stiles and Scott show, and every now and then it needed to be just that again.

Charlie lingered in the locker room for a few minutes. She grabbed a towel, dried herself off, and pulled on that spare set of clean gym clothes she always wore and wrung out her hair into the sink. In a weird way her attempt to get completely dry was a way of wiping that entire memory out of her mind. If she could erase the evidence, it would be like none of it had happened at all. But even after every last drop of liquid was removed, she was still left with those pruny, wrinkly hands that looked like they belonged to an eighty-year-old man. A lasting reminder that she had almost died at school. Again.

After a little while, Charlie forced herself out of the locker room and back into that parking lot, ready to hear whatever crackpot idea or resolution the wonder twins had stumbled upon during her short absence. But as soon as she strode into that lot, she realized that wasn't going to happen. Scott's car was gone. He had left. They had left her. Not that she could really blame them. She had a car and a way home and the danger was over for the evening. She was fine on her own. Totally fine. It was just surprising was all. And a little bit disappointing. Okay, a lot disappointing.

Charlie dragged her feet as she trudged around the line of school buses towards where she had parked her car, but then, as soon as she rounded the corner, she stopped short. There, across the parking lot from where she stood was her car, a burgundy-clad boy firmly seated on the hood. Charlie felt her heart leap with both joy and anxiety when she saw him there. Jumping behind a ficus definitely wasn't an option now. She had face things head on.

As she approached her car, Charlie hopped up on the hood next to Stiles. At first they just sat there silently, like they were waiting for some invitation by the other to start talking.

"Scott had to go pick up his mom from the hospital," Stiles finally said, breaking the silence. But then that silence was renewed just as abruptly as it was broken. It was exactly what Charlie had been afraid of since that kiss. That they wouldn't know how to talk to each other anymore—that they wouldn't know how to interact around each other anymore.

No. That was unacceptable. She refused to allow for this to happen. Stiles meant way, way too much to her to allow the two of them to just drift apart because of a little awkwardness and some minor discomfort. He meant way too much to her to let that happen. If fixing it meant diving head first into the ocean of her own insecurities, then that was just what she was going to have to do.

"Something's been happening to me, Stiles," she whispered just loud enough for him to hear. Out of the corner of her eye she saw his head snap to look at her, but she kept staring straight. She couldn't keep going if she knew what his face looked like. "It's been happening since the night Peter died. It's been weird and terrifying and half the time I thought I was losing my freaking mind. And I—I didn't know what it was. I was scared to talk about it. I was scared of figuring out what it was. I kept telling myself it was all in my head because if I was just being paranoid or something then it would just go away but…but it didn't."

"So you went to Derek?" Stiles asked. He was obviously trying to keep the bitterness out of his voice, but there was still a little bit there. It sounded a little bit like betrayal.

Charlie pressed her lips together in a thin line and nodded. "I went to Derek because I needed help."

"And I couldn't help you?" he asked, frustration seeping into his tone. "Charlie if you needed anything, you know all you ever had to do was ask. If I couldn't help, then—"

"No," she protested, shaking her head. She finally looked up at him, her eyes begging him to understand what she was trying to tell him. "No, you would have helped more. Way more. Honestly you're probably the person who could have helped the most."

"Well then why didn't you come to me?" he asked, his confusion mounting. "Why didn't you tell me? Why Derek of all people?"

Charlie bit her lip and ran her hands down her face, trying to come up best way to express her meaning. "I—I told Derek because I don't give a shit about his opinion, okay? I don't care what he thinks about me. Like as a person." She bit her lip as she looked at him, her eyes beginning to ache as they fought back tears. "I do care what you think about me," she continued, her voice low and harsh. "And if you start looking at me like I'm crazy, I have to start looking at me like I'm crazy too. If I tell you….that makes it real. I can't pretend to be okay anymore, and I wasn't ready to not be okay." She swallowed heavily and ran her hands through her hair, tugging nervously at the ends. "But I'm ready to tell you now," she whispered. "If you're ready to hear it."

Stiles let out a light snort and gave her a comforting smile. "Given how much I've been harassing you about it, I'd say I was probably ready to hear about it a while ago."

Charlie chuckled and nodded in agreement. "Right. Of course." She closed her eyes and took one last deep breath before continuing.

"It—it started with the memory transfer thing Peter did to me," she began. "You know that Vulcan mind meld thing? Well I saw everything. The fire, his recovery, him killing Laura….It—it was all just so vivid. It felt like I could actually taste her blood in my mouth. I felt like my head was going to explode."

Stiles swore under his breath and shook his head, concern etched into every line of his face as he looked at her.

"But it didn't stop that night," Charlie continued. "Since then I've been getting these—these flashes? It's like my brain jumps backwards and I'm reliving one of those moments all over again. I'm burning to death inside the Hale house or I'm Laura in that forest, waiting to die. It only lasts a few seconds, but sometimes I swear it feels like hours. And that's not even the best bit."

A slightly hysterical laugh burbled out of her throat and she scratched at her forehead before getting to the last and arguably most terrifying part. "So now for the cherry on top of this giant ice cream sundae of suck. Peter Hale has been haunting my dreams. He's there every single time I go to sleep and he never fails to just….annoy the crap out of me. Every night he's there with some snide comment or pithy remark on how I live my life, and I swear he's actively trying to drive me insane! It's like when he shoved his claws into my neck he left a smug, miniature version of himself in my head. And the worst part? I think he's actually trying to become my…friend or something and on top of the whole psychosis angle I'm working, it's just seriously weirding me out. I don't know when it's gonna stop and I—I just have no idea what to do."

She let out a shaky breath rubbed at her eyes before turning to Stiles and flashing a big, fake smile. "So welcome to the Charlie Oswin carnival of weird and crazy. Thoughts? Comments?"

Her eyes darted back and forth across his face to gauge his reaction. He stayed quiet for a long time, which was completely understandable. She just dropped a ton on information on him, any one piece of which sounded utterly ridiculous. It was a lot to digest. There was this crease between his eyebrows and the corners of his lips tugged down into a small frown. Oh, crap. He thought she was crazy. He thought she was completely batshit crazy.

"I've got one thought," Stiles whispered, nodding to himself. And then he looked up at her, and he wasn't looking at her like she was crazy. He looked assured. "So what?" he pronounced loudly.

Charlie blinked in confusion. "So what? Stiles, I just told you that I have been seeing visions of Peter Hale in my head on a regular basis!"

He shrugged. "And?"

"And that doesn't concern you?!"

"Yeah, it does," Stiles said, bobbing his head along with his words. "Of course it does. But so what? It might have escaped your notice, but you're Charlie Oswin. You're pretty much the strongest person I've ever met, and—" he lifted up a single finger, waving it in her face "—and keep in mind that I'm best friends with a guy with supernatural healing ability. Whatever the hell is happening to you, you're going to beat it. Because that's what you do. And until you kick Peter's ass back into whatever dank crevasse he crawled out of….." He paused for a moment and gave her this look that was wasn't sure how to describe. "Until then, you've got me. For anything."

Charlie could feel her eyes begin to fill with tears, but this time they weren't the angsty, pained ones. They were the happy kind. She hadn't felt those in a while. "Yeah?" she asked, her voice cracking slightly.

"Always," Stiles proclaimed. "I mean what else are friends for other than offering support when somebody they care about has been brain jacked by a homicidal, psychopathic werewolf? That kind of stuff happens to us all the time—that's like an average Tuesday. One of the boring ones."

It had been said as a joke. It was a light-hearted comment he had thrown together to make her feel better. And on a normal day, it probably would have. But this wasn't a normal day. That kiss last night had pretty much ensured that today was not a normal day. And that one word—'friend'—she honestly wasn't sure what to make of it. Not anymore. Suddenly she was aware of just how close together they were sitting. It was a sort of hyper-awareness. They weren't touching at all but she could just…..feel him next to her. Like static electricity. If she wanted to keep a level head, she needed to move.

Almost immediately, Charlie hopped up off the car and began pacing back and forth in front of it while Stiles watched her in confusion. She could feel her stomach twisting up again, but she forced herself to ignore that feeling. They needed to talk about it. They needed to talk about everything—get it all out and sort through it—if they ever wanted things to get back to how they were. When Charlie finally managed to steel he courage enough, she stopped pacing and turned to face Stiles head on. "We, uh, we should probably talk about—about last night?" she said, gnawing on her fingernails. "I mean, um, while we're talking about….stuff…that's something we should probably, you know, talk about."

Stiles's face morphed into an inscrutable expression and he swallowed heavily before nodding in agreement. "Y—yeah. We probably should."

"I just don't want things to get weird," Charlie barreled on, the words spilling out of her mouth faster than she could actually think of them. "I don't want us to start acting differently around each other because of that one kiss, you know?"

"It's actually two of them now," Stiles pointed out, scratching at the back of his head. "Two kisses. Deux. Dos. Two of them."

Charlie froze for a second. She wasn't quite sure what to do with that observation. "Right," she bit out carefully, forcing her voice to stay even. "Look, Stiles, the point is….I just don't want that to become…a wedge or something. I don't us to not be able to be around each other like we were before because there's that kiss hanging over out heads. It was a vulnerable moment and…..things happen. It doesn't have to change things. We can…we can just acknowledge that it happened and move on. So…" She gestured back and forth between the two of them. "Here we are, acknowledging it. And now we can move on."

"A—absolutely," Stiles stammered. "Consider it acknowledged."

"Great!" Charlie said through a tight smile, clapping her hands together awkwardly. "That's great."

Stiles raised his hand in the air. "One question though."

"Shoot."

"Does this mean it's not going to happen again?"

For what felt like the thousandth time that evening, Charlie found herself at a loss for words. Her eyes widened, her muscles tensed, and she had absolutely no idea what to say. But she did know what to do. So she punched him in the shoulder. Hard.

"AH!" Stiles yelped, jumping up off the hood of the car and grabbing his arm. "How the hell do you hit so hard with your tiny little arms! That should not be physically possible! And why the hell are you hitting me?!"

Charlie gaped at him, letting out a disbelieving laugh. "What the hell, Stilinski?!" she shouted at him. "'Is it going to happen again?' What the hell is that supposed to mean?!"

"Well what does it sound like?!" Stiles shouted back, taking small steps away from her as she advanced on him.

"Oh, come on," she said rolling her eyes. "How long have you known me? Do you really think I would consider - that I would even come close to considering - some sort of 'friends with benefits' type scenario, regardless of how objectively awesome that kiss was? I mean, _come on_!"

"Who's talking about 'friends with benefits'?! I'm not talking about 'friends with benefits'!"

"Well then what the hell are you talking about, Stilinski?"

"I don't know yet," he shouted, still clutching his shoulder. "But it's definitely way more than that!"

Then Charlie stopped. It was like her entire body seized up as she processed his words. Her stomach did this weird sort of flipping things and her heart started pounding in her chest, and this time it wasn't because she was in the middle of a near-death experience. She narrowed her eyes at Stiles, looking at him carefully and studying every move that he made. "Stiles, you've been in love with Lydia since the third grade. You told me that."

"Yeah," he shot back, nodding frantically. "Yeah, I did, but maybe I wouldn't have been if…." He let the words trail off, shutting his eyes and gritting his teeth like he was summoning his courage. "Maybe I wouldn't have been if….if _you_ had been here in the third grade."

The atmosphere around them immediately changed. There wasn't any more anger or shouting, but the air between them thickened. It felt heavy against her skin and made it hard for her to breathe. Charlie exhaled sharply and stared at him with an expression of stunned disbelief. "When the hell did this happen?" she said, her voice barely above a whisper.

Stiles let out an awkward chuckle and shrugged. "Honestly I've got no idea," he said, shaking his head and rubbing at the back of his neck. "Apparently it's been going on lot longer than I realized. You know what they say about hindsight being twenty-twenty." He balled his hand up into a fist and slammed it against his forehead like he did sometimes when he was frustrated with himself. "I mean looking back now it probably started around that time you dragged me and Scott out to the bowling alley so he wouldn't look like a total idiot on his date. I remember when we got there you got a strike, and then you did this ridiculous jig and quoted 'The Big Lebowski'. I—I just remember thinking, 'this girl is my kind of idiot.'"

He glanced at the shocked expression on her face and nodded, pointing at her like he knew exactly what she was thinking. "I know. Pretty early on, right? But I just…I didn't see it. I was so focused on Lydia that I was pretty much blind to anything else and then….then after Winter Formal I remember waking up in the hospital and you were sitting there, sleeping with your head on my shoulder—there was a little bit of drool coming out of the corner of your mouth and you were mumbling something about spaghetti—and I just…wanted you to never move. I wanted you to just stay there, asleep on my shoulder, forever. Because what could possibly be better than that? Yeah…the realization pretty much punched me in the face right there. And it was brutal. Because at that point I had literally spent months actively friend-zoning myself by rambling about how I had feelings for your best friend!"

"After that," he continued, "after that I thought…. I don't know, I thought that maybe I could show you gradually over time that things had…changed. Maybe if I was patient, it could all work out. And then last night you kissed me and—"

"Hey, I didn't kiss you," Charlie said, pointing at him matter-of-factly. "Just to clarify. We kissed, but I didn't actively set out to kiss you."

"Ugh!" Stiles said throwing his hands in the air. "Why does everything always have to be a semantic argument with you?! We kissed! There was kissing! And it was…..Like you said, it was objectively awesome. It was incredible. It was like the freaking fireworks from the Fourth of July got together with the ones from New Year's Eve and they decided to hold a huge freaking party! And that started me thinking that maybe….."

He let out a small groan and ran his hands down his face. When he looked up at her again, his eyes were piercing, like he was trying to see into her head and figure out what she was thinking. "Okay," he sighed out, sounding kind of drained. "The gist of it is that I have feelings for you that are in no way Platonic. Do…do you think that maybe….maybe you could feel the same way?"

This was the part in the story where she was supposed to run into his arms, wrap her arms around his neck, and they would kiss passionately. That's how the romantic comedy was supposed to end, right? It was the scene right before the big fade out. Well apparently Charlie wasn't quite cut out to me the heroine in a romantic comedy. There was no running. There was no incandescent smiling. There was no gleeful giggling. She just stood there, completely dumbfounded, with her mouth hanging open. The image would have not made a good movie poster.

It was like her brain had slow internet connection or something. She was trying to process the information, but her mind was still buffering. The result? Stunned silence.

Slowly, the hopeful expression on Stiles's face fell, regret and disappointment filling his gaze. He interpreted her silence as an indication of the negative and immediately began back-tracking. "O—okay," he said, holding his hands up. "We can forget that I ever said any of that. We can just go back to being friends or whatever, because that's enough for me and—"

He probably could have gone on rambling for a lot longer, but Charlie didn't want to hear any of it. Somewhere in the middle of those disappointed mutterings her head caught up with her heart and she marched forwards, taking his face in her hands and staring pointedly into those huge, light brown eyes. "Stiles," she enunciated carefully. "For once in your life, just shut the hell up."

And then she pushed herself up on her tiptoes, pressing her lips firmly against his with conviction. Like she was making a point. She poured all of her feelings, all of her gratitude, all of her appreciation for him into that one short kiss. Her lips only stayed against his a few seconds before she rocked back on her heels, her eyes scanning his face for a reaction. Even after that big declaration, she was still humming with anticipation, not sure how it was going to play out. At first he looked kind of concussed. His eyes were clouded over and his mouth hanging open every-so slightly, lips moving like they were trying to form words but couldn't, but then he snapped out of it, blinking back into consciousness. Shock, surprise, confusion, joy, excitement, relief—they all flitted across his face in the space of a second, followed by that tiny little smile that made her heart skip. Charlie pursed her lips and shrugged. "Your move, Stilinski. What's it gonna be?"

A small, disbelieving laugh burbled out of his throat and he stood there, just looking at her for a good long time. And then he ducked down, letting his lips capturing hers.

It occurred to Charlie that this…this was how being kissed was supposed to feel. All of those other times there had been something else lurking in the background—some sort of agenda being filled. The first time they had kissed it was born out of frustration. The second time it was trying to find some temporary relief from the anxiety she suffering through. This time…this time it was just them. It was her and Stiles, and nothing else. And it was incredible.

The two of them melted into each other, her arm circling his neck while his made their way to her waist. They fit. That was the only way Charlie could think of to describe it. They just fit. She grabbed hold of his shirt collar and pushed herself up on her tiptoes, trying to bring them as close together as humanly possible. Her lips never left his for an instant. The urgency which they were moving against each other—it almost felt like they were trying to make up for lost time. There was no doubt, no insecurity. Charlie started getting this heady feeling, like her senses were taking over. His hands on her hips, the heat of his skin, the feeling of his heart beating in his chest—all of his engulfed her, blocking everything else out.

And then they stumbled backwards. It was only one step but it was enough to cause Charlie to make a weird, surprised squeaking noise while her lips were still pressed to his. There lips moved together for a few more moments, but she could feel Stiles smiling against her mouth. It was barely half a second before they both busted out laughing.

"What the hell was that noise?" Stiles laughed, his eyes glowing happily as he looked at her. "You sounded like a dying parrot!"

"Shut up, Stilinski," Charlie scoffed, still clutching his shoulders for support. "I'm not the one who had to go and ruin the moment by tripping over his own freaking feet! I thought lacrosse players were supposed to have decent powers of coordination."

"That had nothing to do with coordination," Stiles smirked back. "The force you were throwing yourself at me? I'm surprised you didn't knock me straight onto the asphalt!"

The two of them glowered at each other for a while, but it was impossible to keep the smiles off their faces. Not smiling hurt. Until they started smiling, and that hurt their cheeks any more. But Charlie was pretty sure neither of them had any intention of stopping. After a few moments of them grinning at each other like total idiots, Charlie cleared her throat and forced some sort of composure. "Um, so…." she began casually, reaching up and straightening his jacket. "That thing we just did. Would you say that….clarified some things for you? With regards to how our relationship may develop? In the future?"

Stiles pursed his lips in thought and looked up at the sky for a moment. "Bah…well…a couple of things, maybe," he drawled out. "But not nearly enough. You know me…I'm just—I'm just wracked with insecurities. I think I need a little bit more convincing."

"Oh do you?" Charlie snorted.

"Um, yeah," Stiles said, bobbing his head a bit. "I do. And the fact that you're mocking me at such a delicate time—" he placed his hand over his heart "—it hurts me. Deeply."

"Well I guess I'll just have to find a way to make it up to you."

"Yeah. I guess you will."

And then the look in his eye changed. It wasn't that sheer joy of moments ago. It became something softer, more tender. His right hand reached forwards and cupped her cheek, slowly guiding her face towards his and brushing the skin along her jawline with his thumb. His left found its way to hers, grabbing hold of it and lacing their fingers together. This time the kiss was much slower—much more thoughtful. It was solidifying. Like the both of them knew this was exactly where to be. And even though the way their lips moved gave her plenty of time to breathe, Charlie still found herself gasping for air at the end. "Why exactly weren't we doing this the whole time?" she laughed out, shaking her head self-consciously.

Stiles made a face and shrugged. "Meh. Because I'm a blind idiot and you're emotionally constipated?"

"Ah!" Charlie exclaimed, snapping her fingers and pointing at him in agreement. "I knew there was reason."

Then the two of them looked around and realized where they were. At school. In the parking lot. At 10:00 pm. Charlie looked up at Stiles and scratched at the back of her neck, an amused wince covering her features. "We should probably head home, shouldn't we?"

"Yeah….." he drawled out, surveying the area. "Yeah, probably. We don't want my dad to start issuing APBs. Hey, what's that?!"

Charlie turned in the direction Stiles was pointing, but there was nothing there. And then Stiles swooped in and planted one last sneaky kiss on her lips and jogged to the passenger side of her car, grinning ear to ear. Charlie flushed red and nervously tucked her hair behind her ears as he ran. She would have to get used to this. She _wanted_ to get used to this.

When he reached the passenger door, Stiles folded his arms on the roof and perched his chin on his hands, his eyes following her as she moved towards the driver's side. "You know I'm really glad things worked out here," he said, waving his hands around aimlessly. "With my Jeep still impounded I didn't really have another ride. It could have gotten like super-awkward."

"Really?" Charlie demanded, her eyebrows shooting up into her hairline. "That's what you're happy about? That's the big payoff in this scenario—that you didn't have to call your dad to come pick you up from school? Real nice, Stilinski."

Stiles let out a dramatic scoff and rolled his eyes. "I said it was _a _benefit, not _the _benefit."

"Less than ten minutes in and you're already bumming rides," she said, shaking her head at him. "You're gonna be a needy one, aren't you?"

"Hey!" Stiles proclaimed, snapping his fingers and pointing at her. "I am worth the effort!"

When Charlie got to the driver's side door, she perched her arms on the hood as well mimicking Stiles's position. "You realize this isn't going to change anything, right?" she said gesturing back and forth between the two of them. "I'm not going to start letting you win at 'Halo'."

"Oh," Stiles said, frowning slightly and sighing in mock regret. "Well I guess there's not really a point to all this is there? Let's just quit while we're ahead."

The both of them tried to keep a straight face, but that proved pretty much impossible. Inside of thirty seconds they were grinning again.

"You're an idiot," she said, narrowing her eyes at him.

"_You're_ an idiot," he repeated, waggling his eyebrows.

Charlie snorted and took deep breath, biting her lip as she looked at him. It was the beginning of something new, something unknown. Charlie honestly had no idea where this was going. And she had never been so happy to be totally and utterly clueless in her entire life.

"Get in the damn car, Stilinski."

**Okay. So there you go. I hope that you liked it and that it suited them. Personally I think it did. Charlie wasn't going to give in until she was at least a little sure, and Stiles...well he's Stiles. I love them both dearly. I hope this made you nearly as happy as it made me.  
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**SOUNDTRACK!**

**Charlie does her French homework. If this was a TV show it would be more than that. It would be her displaying a lot of nervous ticks and looking all angsty and stuff...you know how it goes.**

****-~-~-~-~-**Wait - Lazy Eyes  
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**Charlie gets ready for the lacrosse game and puts on her dad's hat.**

**-~-~-~-~-Hurricane - MS MR (So this song is more popular and well known than the ones I usually use. I like introducing people to new music, so I'm more likely to pick stuff not quite so popular. But it was pointed out to me by a reader-DraxThePacifist- that this song fit Charlie and Stiles pretty perfectly. I had heard the song before but never thought about it in that context. Now that I have heard it, I can't not agree! It's a perfect snapshot of Charlie in that moment. So thanks, Drax!)**

**Charlie shows up at the game and walks through the crowds.  
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****-~-~-~-~-Sci-Fi Bandits - Chappo  
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****The group sees the kanima and they run.****

******-~-~-~-~-**Comfortable, Comfortable (Zambi Remix) - Hooray for Earth (So the beginning of this song is really disorienting, but then again that's what I'm going for. They're running for their lives after all.)  
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****Charlie and Stiles reach for the handholds to keep them alive, but slip and begin sinking into the water. Charlie thinks she's about to die.****

******-~-~-~-~-**Uranus - Sleeping at Last  
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****Charlie retreats to the locker room and changes before returning to the parking lot to find Stiles sitting on her car.****

******-~-~-~-~-Family and Friends - Young Jesus**  
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****Charlie and Stiles talk. She tells him about everything going on with Peter.  
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******-~-~-~-~-**Beautiful Things - Androcles and the Lion  
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****The kiss.****

******-~-~-~-~-**The John Wayne - Little Green Cars  
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****Charlie and Stiles bicker and get into the car, driving off into the night on a brand new adventure! (God, that sounded cheesy.)****

******-~-~-~-~-**She Comes Alive - Baby Monster  
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****Also, DAMMIT LAURA WEBB, STOP READING MY MIND! If you look in the 'Starred' tracks on my Spotify account, you'll find Jungle by X Ambassadors and Jamie N Commons. I was looking for the right moment to use it (it's been there for over a month!) and then she had to go use it in an episode?! Seriously?! I love your taste, but AHHH! If you use 'Run' by Kill It Kid, I swear you're reading my mind. GET OUT OF MY HEAD!  
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	16. Definitions

**Oh, my God, it's been so long. I'm sorry it took me so long to post this, but I do have my reasons and they go thusly:**

**1) Work has been absolutely insane. I work 12 hours a day so I can't really write during the week and I've worked the past two Saturdays. Ugh. So not much time for writing.**

**2) I've learned how to Tumbl! That's my internet-illiterate way of telling you I've been educating myself as to how to use Tumblr. I may or may not be good at it yet, but my account exists! There's a link on my profile.**

**3) This chapter is the longest one I've ever written. Seriously, it's twice as long as my average chapters, which aren't exactly short to begin with.**

**4) I recently got some news and...I'm MOVING TO NEW YORK! I've started working in the film industry (there are some movies shooting in my home town). The pitfall of this is that every 4-5 months I have to look for a new job or face unemployment. I was reaching a certain level of anxiety as that time rolled around and then, bam, a co-worker offered me a new job. In New York. AHHHHHHHHH! **

**5 (and possibly most importantly) I found a video clip of Hugh Jackman singing about playing Wolverine to the tune of a "Les Miserables" song. I've been watching that a lot. Yeah...**

**Disclaimer: 'Teen Wolf' isn't mine. Shocking, right? But it's true. If there are any similarities in content or dialogue, it has probably originated with the show.**

**A huge thank you to We're All M-M-Mad Here, AmyRoxx123, Guest 1, Guest 2, Valkyrie101, Shes-The-Proto-Type, Devon Laurel, pennamethathasn'tbeentaken, SK-Scatenato, My mother is a koala, Noxen, AyeKay10, VampireWizardsWeresOhMy, bagginsoftheshire666, Atomicity, zvc56, Sonny13, PhoenixRage92, L. , WillowSeeker, Gee Brittany, TheMMMG, katiesgotagun, Undeniable Weirdness, Paige, Etro13, shy-lady, Just Anonymous, Oracle90, Ayine, PurpleRaining, onethousandmoths, BewareTheBearShark, Guest 3, Guest 4, Guest 5, Guest 6, and Guest 7 for reviewing!**

**I apologize for grammar issues! I don't have the energy to proof read, so you will see my stupid mistakes within.**

Chapter 16 – Definitions

Holy crap. Had that happened? Had all of that actually happened?

The next morning, Charlie woke up a long, long time before her alarm went off, and this time she couldn't blame an early-morning call from Lydia or even Stiles. Hell, she couldn't even blame the neighbors' dog that always chose the most inconvenient times to start barking. It was all on her. It was her freaking brain that wouldn't shut the hell up.

What the hell had happened last night?

Okay, so she knew that had happened last night. She could remember every single minute detail. Vividly. She could remember the fear. She could remember the anxiety. She could remember the feeling of slipping under the water and thinking she would never be able to taste air again. And then there was the other bit. The bit that only made her _feel_ like she couldn't breathe.

After that kiss, Charlie had been walking around kind of like she was on Cloud Nine. She would never describe herself as the type of girl who got 'giddy' or 'giggly', but if she had ever gotten anything close to either of those two adjectives, it would have been last night. After finally leaving the school, she had driven him home, the two of them fighting over control of the radio the entire way there. Then she had insisted on walking him to the door. At first he hadn't been all that pleased with that idea, saying it was probably on that 'ways to emasculate Stiles' list he had accused her of carrying around on multiple occasions. Until she pointed out that her walking him to the door meant he got a goodnight kiss. That seemed to resolve the whole issue fairly quickly. And then when she had gotten into her car to go home she could still see him there, standing in the doorway and watching her until she disappeared.

When she had gotten home, she had had to bite her lip to keep from smiling. It was almost like she was in one of those cliché movies. She stepped inside, closing the door behind her and collapsing against it with a small satisfied sigh. For once she was really freaking glad that Mel was out on a date with her economics teacher. If she had seen Charlie in that moment, it would have been a complete and total nightmare. One look, and Mel would have divined the whole thing. Charlie would have been totally busted. Mel might not be the most perceptive person in the world, but as it turned out when it came to romance she was a freaking bloodhound.

Then Charlie closed herself off in her room, and that's when she heard them. The little doubting voices whispering in her ear. Charlie didn't do relationships. Charlie wasn't good at relationships. Charlie was the kind of person who undermined her relationships until they completely exploded. And this thing with Stiles? It was a big, big risk. A huge one. What if she did what she always did? What if she screwed it all up? Crap. She was going to have to turn herself into an actual, functional human being.

She wasn't going to screw it up. Not this time. She refused. She absolutely refused.

Charlie rolled over in her bed and looked back at those red blinking letters on her alarm clock. It read 6:34 am. Great. Fantastic. That meant she had been lying in bed for over an hour and a half, obsessing about how she was going to keep herself from messing this up. The irony of the whole situation was that her obsessing about how _not_ to mess it up was probably what was going to cause her to mess it up in the first place. Oh well. At least the neurotic obsessing was better than the recap with Peter. In those few hours of sleep she had actually gotten, he had greeted her with a slow clap, wrapped her in a bear hug, and mused happily about how 'his little girl was growing up', and was sure to ask her what exactly what Stiles's intentions were. The whole experience was more than slightly horrifying, and not for the usual reasons.

It was almost like a clock had been shoved inside her head. That imaginary tick, tick, tick echoed in her ears, counting down the seconds until her alarm rang and told her it was time to wake the hell up. When the pale grey rays of early morning light began to leak through, Charlie couldn't wait anymore. She threw back the covers of her bed covers and clambered out. She would have liked to say that she was ready to take on the day, but that would have been a lie. Charlie was freaking the hell out. And that freaking out manifested itself in the most improbable way Charlie could ever think of. Her outfit.

That's right, world. Charlie Oswin was worried about clothes. Go ahead and laugh it up.

Under normal circumstances the decision would have been a simple one. When it came to clothes, Charlie had a basic, two step process. Step one was the sniff test. Did those clothes smell moderately clean? If the answer was yes, she could move on to step two. Step two consisted of a very simple question. Did the color/style combination make her want to claw her eyes out? No? Alright, then. She was good to go. Throw on the Converse, braid the hair, smudge on some eyeliner and that was all there was to it. There was barely any thought in it at all.

Inside of about twenty minutes the clothes that were usually isolated to that rumpled laundry basket of clean clothes were strewn across her room. Charlie even found herself holding pieces up to her form in the mirror. It was only when she was holding one of Lydia's dresses that had managed to migrate over to her house up to her form that she somehow managed to snap herself out of it. Clothes didn't make the least little bit of difference. Last night she and Stiles had kissed while she was wearing a set of sweats from the bottom of her gym locker and her wet, stringy hair had kind of made her look like a drowned rat. That was the big moment. Her worrying about something like this was absolutely ridiculous. But that didn't stop her from choosing one of the four skirts that resided in her closet. Ugh. All of Lydia's speeches were definitely getting under her skin. But she drew the line at high heels. Screw high heels—she was never, ever wearing high heels. All the times she ended up running for her life? High heels did not go well with her lifestyle.

By the time Charlie stopped being neurotic, it was almost time for her to leave for school. That soft dawn light that peeked through earlier had morphed into something harsher and yellower. Charlie marched towards her drapes and yanked them apart, letting her room fill with light. She stood in front of her mirror and looked at her reflection in the floor-length mirror mounted on her closet door. A black skater skirt, a simple silk shirt, a pair of mid-calf boots, and some burgundy knee socks, and one of her seemingly infinite supply of leather jackets. She looked normal. It was just another day. Except that it wasn't.

"Suck it up, Oswin."

Then Charlie blinked. She squeezed her eyes shut for just a moment and released a breath, trying to steady herself. She managed to reach some small degree of peace, but once she opened them again it was like somebody had taken a sledgehammer to it. The reflection she was looking at belonged to her, but it wasn't _her_ anymore. The entire left side of her face was puckered and scarred, covered with angry, twisting scars. It looked like there had been some horrible, gruesome fire at Madame Tousseau's Wax Museum, and she was staring at the result. It was a hallucination. It was all a hallucination. Or that's what she kept telling herself. But then her twisted reflection smiled at her and lifted its hand to give a smug wave while her actual hands stayed limp at her side. And suddenly the reflection wasn't even her face anymore. Suddenly it was Peter waving at her.

Her pulse shot up, her breathing became ragged, and she instinctively threw herself backwards, tumbling back on her bed. She squeezed her eyes shut once more. If it was a dream, she would want to wake up. But it wasn't a dream. "Ten...nine...eight..."

When Charlie finished counting down from ten, she slowly reached up a hand and felt the skin of her face. It was soft and smooth. Normal. Finally she cracked an eye and peeked back at her reflection. All she saw were her own terrified eyes.

Swearing under her breath, Charlie pushed herself up from her bed and kicked at the small pile of discarded clothes she had created in her slightly frantic and uncoordinated attempts to get ready. Not even one day. Peter couldn't leave her alone for a single freaking day. And the worst bit about it was his face while he waved at her from the mirror. It wasn't even menacing or hostile. It was cheerful. He might as well have handed her a glass of orange juice and told her to have a nice day. Even dead he just wouldn't stop screwing with her. Or was he encouraging her? Honestly she couldn't tell the difference anymore.

But even after that hallucination Charlie just stood in her room, unmoving. Roots seemed to be extending from her feet, latching her to the ground. Because, if she was being honest, all this emotional stuff—opening herself up to the possibility of getting hurt—was a hell of a lot scarier than a couple of Peter-induced hallucinations. It meant she would have to confront something in herself she had buried a lot more deeply than a couple of bad dreams and flashbacks. She gritted her teeth and clenched her fists, drawing up every ounce of determinations she had.

"Screw it."

With those two words Charlie wrenched her feet from that spot on the floor, grabbed her messenger bag from its spot on the floor, and marched towards the front door before climbing into her car and peeling out the drive way. The ride to school was spent muttering assurances and self-actualizing statements that Dr. Hamilton had thrown at her during her brief stint in therapy. She could do this. She could.

When Charlie pulled into the parking lot of Beacon Hills High School, she was still muttering to herself, attracting more than a few odd looks from random passersby. "You can do this," she whispered under her breath. "You can totally do this. There's nothing to worry about."

Then she saw him. Stiles was sitting there on the front steps of the school, backpack lying on the ground next to him, like he was waiting for someone. Charlie trudged to a stop about ten yards ahead and just looked at him. He hadn't spotted her yet. From the looks of things, he kind of seemed nervous. He was drumming his fingers against the side of his leg with one hand and rubbing at the back of his neck with the other, and all the while his lips were moving a little bit, like he was mouthing words. Like he was rehearsing. Then, almost by chance, he looked up across the parking lot and saw her.

In that moment, it was like everything stopped. Not because it was some particularly awe-inspiring, romantic moment, but because Charlie felt a sudden jolt of fear in her stomach. Last night had been a beautiful moment—one that she had wanted to happen for longer than she probably admitted to herself. But last night was last night, and things looked different under the harsh light of day. So she waited with baited breath, her stomach tying itself into knots. Her hands tightened around the strap of her messenger bag, clutching onto it like it was a security blanket.

And then Stiles smiled. It wasn't a type smile she recognized from him. It was a new one. His eyes were happy, excited, and almost a little bit relieved, and his lips were pinched a little, like he was trying to keep the smile from completely overtaking his entire face and failing. It was the kind of smile you would wear when seeing an old friend for the first time in a long, long time. You finally see them again and it's like they've been reborn in front of your eyes. As familiar as that person is to you, it's like you're seeing them for the first time all over again. They were in the same story as before. They had just started a new chapter.

Almost immediately, Charlie felt the tension seep out of her. Yes, she was a mess. She was a ship being whipped around in a storm. But Stiles? He was steady. He was an anchor. And he wouldn't let her drift too far.

Charlie stood there, frozen in place for a few moments, and then she smiled back. As she began to walk towards him, Stiles scrambled to his feet, somehow managing to trip over his own backpack in the process. He had just managed to sling the thing over his shoulders as she approached him. "H—hey," he said, giving an awkward and jerk-y wave.

Charlie bit her lip to keep her smile from growing. "Hey," she mumbled back.

The two of them looked at each other expectantly, like each was expecting the other to have the first word. But, for possibly the first time in the history of the world, both Charlotte Oswin and Stiles Stilinski couldn't think of a damn thing to say.

"Hi," Stiles finally said, nodding at her.

"Hi," Charlie repeated stupidly.

Cue more awkward staring, awkward smiling, awkward nodding, and awkward silence. It was a freaking orgy of awkward. The smile on Charlie's face turned tight and then slowly turned into a wince. "God, we really suck at this, don't we?"

"Thank God you said it," Stiles said, letting out a sigh of relief and doubling over at the waist. "I've been trying to come up with some great opening line or whatever for hours. You know what the best thing I could come up with is?"

"Please," Charlie said, waving her hand and indicating for him to continue. "Enlighten me."

Stiles opened his mouth to tell her, but then he cocked his head to the side and furrowed his eyebrows a bit. Apparently thinking better of it, he snapped his mouth back shut. "You know what?" he said, shaking his head. "No. I think I'm going to make a little detour past that exercise in self-humiliation."

"Wha—?" Charlie demanded, her jaw dropping open in protest. "Oh, come on! You can't tease it and leave it like that! It's not like I don't already know that it's going to be rambling and semi-coherent."

Immediately Stiles planted his hands on his hips and narrowed his eyes at her. "Hey!" he exclaimed, sounding more that a little bit scandalized. "I—" he pointed at himself "—I am an incredibly articulate person. I'm great with words—I'm a frigging wordsmith! I'll write you a haiku right now that'll make you freaking cry."

"Great," Charlie said, gesturing at him to continue. "Go for it." Once again Stiles opened his mouth and snapped it back shut. Charlie wrinkled her nose at him and shook her head admonishingly. "Get your act together, Stilinski," she drawled out sarcastically. "You're supposed to under-promise and over-deliver, not the other way around. Didn't you know that?"

"Ugh," Stiles muttered, rolling his eyes at her dramatically. "I hate you do much right now."

Charlie threw her hands in the air and shrugged. "Don't hate the player, hate the game. I didn't make the rules—I just play by them."

"Right," Stiles smirked. "Because you have such extensive experience when it comes to relationships."

"I didn't say it was extensive," Charlie replied. "There's only ever been that one other one." The mention of another relationship made Stiles go a little pale all of the sudden, in turn making Charlie snort to herself. "I was married to Eric Parker for two days in kindergarten. It was a whirlwind type thing. He let me borrow his gameboy and I shared my Doritos with him. Until he bailed on me for Becca Simpson."

"Huh," Stiles mumbled, staring out into space for a bit. When he looked down at her, his features were arranged in a quizzical expression. "Is it weird that I'm a bit jealous of Eric Parker?"

Charlie bit back a laugh and rolled her eyes. "Yes, Stiles. It's weird that you're jealous of Eric Parker."

He narrowed his eyes and looked at her suspiciously. "I'm not so sure about that. I mean, you never offer me any Doritos. I—I feel as if I am owed Doritos. You should probably go to the vending machine and get me a bag of Doritos right now. Like immediately. Before I start feeling neglected."

"I never offer you Doritos because you just reach into the bag and take them," she shot back.

"Well, it's the principle of the thing!" he said, nodding at her seriously. "I think I shouldn't have to steal Doritos from you. I think that you should offer me the Doritos before I'm forced to steal them."

"You're fixating on food again," Charlie said, peering at him curiously. "Did you skip breakfast?"

A slightly defensive frown pulled at the corner of Stiles's lips and he jerked his head to the side noncommittally. "I might have. My stomach was a little jumpy—what's your point?"

Charlie clapped a hand on his shoulder and stared at him earnestly. "Stiles..." she drawled out dramatically. "I promise you this from the bottom of my heart. I will buy you a bag of Doritos at lunch today."

"Well honestly I think that's the least you could do," he replied, bobbing his head at her.

Just then the first bell rang, making the both of them jump a little. They had gotten so wrapped up in their usual bickering that they had failed to register pretty much everything else going on around them, including the passage of time. As they looked around, they found the exterior to the school pretty much vacant. There were a few open parking spots left for the stragglers, but the lot had pretty much filled and people were filing inside. Stiles opened and closed his mouth a few times and then jerked his head in direction of the front door. "Do you wanna—"

"Yeah," Charlie said, swallowing heavily and nodding. "Yeah, sure."

As the two of them strolled into the school, they resumed their previous silence. Somehow the only thing they had managed to talk about for any significant period of time was Doritos. Shockingly, that didn't help all that much when it came to clarifying the current status of their relationship. Charlie wasn't sure why, but she felt like she should be say something important—something poignant—and her brain couldn't think of anything good enough to be verbalized. It was kind of a lot of pressure. Until she felt something brush against the back of her hand and she realized she didn't need to say anything at all.

Charlie glanced down at her hand hanging down by her side. Stiles's was hanging right next to it, and they would both brush against each other as they moved. And then she saw a few of his fingers extend outwards, reaching towards hers. Charlie's eyes suddenly snapped up to find Stiles looking down at her with a questioning expression. She felt her heart swell a little and pressed her lips together in an almost imperceptible smile. A giant grin split across Stiles's face, and those few fingers linked. After a few moments, her hand was clasped in his, their fingers laced together. She was walking through the hallways of Beacon Hills High, holding hands with Stiles Stilinski.

All of the sudden Stiles cleared his throat, breaking the silence. "So I need to tell you something right now," he said, looking at her out of the corner of his eye. "Because I know if I put it off for any longer you're gonna get all mad and your face is going to go all red and blotchy, and nobody wants that. Plus you'll probably punch me again."

"Okay," Charlie murmured, looking up at him curiously. "That's pretty cryptic."

"It's about Scott."

"What about him?" she asked.

"Allison's grandfather stabbed him last night. He's fine, but—" Immediately Charlie came to a screeching halt, stopping in the middle of the hallway. Stiles, on the other hand, continued to walk until their joined hands forced him to stumble backwards in her direction. "What the—"

"Scott was stabbed?!" Charlie hissed, narrowing her eyes at him. She yanked him towards the lockers and out of the foot traffic, making him yelp loudly at the whiplash he was no doubt experiencing. But Charlie ignored the protests. "Seriously?!" she whispered-yelled at him once they were out of the way. "Scott was stabbed last night and that's not what you lead with?!"

"Well what was I supposed to say?" Stiles replied quickly. "'The kissing was nice last night—by the way, Scott was stabbed by a psycho grandpa. Let's discuss how royally screwed we are.' Does that sound like a good way to start the day?"

"It does when that psycho grandpa is actively hunting down and killing werewolves," Charlie shot back. She swore under her breath and pinched at the bridge of her nose before taking a deep breath to calm herself down. "Is Scott okay?"

"He's fine," Stiles assured her. "He's totally fine. But Gerard wants something from him and won't say what. Not yet."

"I do not like the sound of that," Charlie said, shaking her head. "Gerard doesn't make idle threats. Or idle requests."

"But it's definitely better than the first threat he made," Stiles pointed out, raising his eyebrows for emphasis. "You remember that first threat? It involved a broadsword and...chopping. I mean at least this time we have time to deal with it. And we know who and what we're dealing with. We're okay. For now." He looked left and right, like he was making sure nobody else was listening in. "Look, we can talk about it in-depth later, okay? Preferably in a place that the broadsword wielding maniac is not principal of. I just—I thought you should know."

Charlie closed her eyes for a moment and nodded in agreement. Gerard was one of those types who could randomly appear anywhere at a given moment in time. When she opened them again, Stiles nodded at her reassuringly and squeezed her hand a little tighter before the two of them continued on the way to her locker. "Jesus," she muttered bitterly. "Can't we just have like one villain? I feel like we have at least three of them at all times. I mean think about it." She began ticking off numbers on the fingers of her free hand. "Last time we were dealing with Kate and the alpha and Jackson—"

"Jackson counts as a villain?" Stiles said with a snort.

"Absolutely he does," Charlie said, giving him a definitive nod. "At the very least he's a nemesis. And he's definitely a pain in the ass."

"Can't argue with that last one."

"And now," she barreled on, starting the count all over again, "now we've got crazy grandpa, Derek who's losing it with all this 'turning teenagers' stuff, and a kanima. That's three separate threats we have to deal with at the same time. If you ask me that's kind of—"

All of the sudden Charlie stopped short, her words dying on her lips. There, a few yards down the hallway, was Allison, and she was headed in their direction. A sensation flooded through her—the sensation of someone who was about to be caught. It was like her brain short-circuited. It all flashed through her head in the space of a second—Allison smiling, Allison squealing, Allison planning double dates, Allison prying her for details she wasn't ready to give yet—asking questions she didn't know the answers to yet. The smiling, the giggling, the sharing. She looked between Stiles, their joined hands, and Allison, and twitched with alarm. On instinct, she tightened her hold on Stiles's hand and darted for a nearby closet, pulling him in with her. Apparently hiding in closets was an instinct for her.

"Charlie, what the—" he protested as she shut the door behind him. A mop handle seemed to jump out of nowhere, smacking him in the face. He fought with it a bit before managing to shove it out of the way and rounding on her. "What the hell was that?"

"Relax," she panted out through slightly anxious breaths, tucking her hair behind her ears. "It was just a mop."

"Wha—no not that." Stiles gestured at the door. "I'm talking about that—out there. What was that?!"

"Allison was out there," Charlie replied. "She was walking towards us. She would have seen—"

"Seen what?" Stiles demanded. "Us walking together? Us talking together? That happens like every day. And who cares if—" And then Stiles stopped. It was kind of hard to tell in the darkness of the closet, but the thin streams of light leaking though allowed her to see that look of realization wash across his face. He held up his hand, dragging hers up with it. Then he waved those linked hands in front of her, like it was Exhibit A in somebody's prosecution. And she got the feeling that it was quickly about to become hers. "Oh my—" he stammered, looking at her accusingly. "Y—you haven't told her about us yet. You haven't told her about...the thing."

"The thing?" Charlie demanded, wrinkling her nose at him.

"You know what I mean!" Stiles hissed. He released her hand and pointed back and forth between the two of them almost violently. "You haven't told her about the thing! About the us—the you and me—the...the thing!"

"How am I supposed to tell her what it is since we apparently don't even know what to call it yet!" Charlie hissed back.

Stiles snapped his fingers and pointed at her. "Hey!" he growled. "No deflecting. You can't sneak that by me—I am the frigging king of deflecting! You can't deflect a deflector! Why haven't you told her yet?!"

Charlie sighed and rubbed at her forehead. "Stiles, it happened like 16 hours ago. Why am I supposed to have told her by now? It's been like two seconds."

"It has not been two seconds!" Stiles protested. "16 hours and two seconds are not the same thing!"

"I was being hyperbolic," Charlie groaned. And then she frowned to herself. "Or is it hypobolic? Since I'm underplaying the time difference instead of over-playing it."

"Who cares what type of 'bolic' you were being," Stiles shot back. "I called Scott as soon as you dropped my off at my house."

"Yeah, but the two of you are like scary co-dependent."

Stiles let out a scoff and planted his hands on his hips. Even in the dark she knew the serious yet goofy 'affronted' look he had on his face. "Really? We're getting into that this early in the relationship?"

"So I haven't told Allison yet," Charlie said, throwing her hands in the air in frustration. "Why would that change anything? Maybe I want to take a little bit of time to figure out the transition—to figure out what ...this...us...is to figure out what we are before other people and their impressions and agendas get involved in it." She took a step forward and grabbed hold of his jacket, pulling him a little bit closer and staring up at his face. He avoided her eyes, opting instead to stare at the ceiling, but in the dim light she could tell by the expression on his face that he was actively trying not to look at her. She leaned further forwards, pressing her lips against his for just a moment, but Stiles didn't kiss back. She could tell that he wanted to, but he was sulking. "Besides," she murmured, kissing him lightly one more time. "Sneaking around is kinda hot, don't you think?"

Stiles shrugged lightly and jerked his head to the side, seeming to consider her words, but then he shook his head violently like he was trying to shake off the though. Stiles finally looked down at her, but there was hesitation in his eyes. "Why do we have to keep it to ourselves? What, are you...I don't know, are you embarrassed by me or something?"

As soon as the words left his mouth, Charlie took a step back and released her hold on his jacket. Apparently Stiles was a hurt by her suggestion to take a bit of time before they revealed everything about their newfound...whatever it was. But asking her that, it hurt too. A lot, actually. The fact that he was questioning her feelings for him was pretty much the most ridiculous thing she had ever heard.

But then again she had never exactly won any awards for her ability to express human emotion. She was the self-described emotionally constipated Charlie. And Stiles was a 'wear your heart on your sleeve' type of guy. She might have to be a bit more open than him than she was used to being with everybody else. But, unfortunately, that emotional constipation was paired with a bad case of verbal diarrhea and her sarcasm ran away with her like it usually did. "Yes, Stiles" she drawled out. "I'm embarrassed by you. That's why I've publicly hung out with you almost every day for the past four months and made out with you on multiple occasions. I was getting your guard down before I enact a vicious prank."

Stiles snapped his fingers and pointed at her like he had uncovered a clue. "So you admit it, then?"

"Shut up," Charlie replied, smacking his hand out of her face. "You know I'm not embarrassed by you."

"Well what is it, then?" Stiles demanded, shrugging his shoulders at her. "Why didn't you want Allison to see us?"

Charlie folded her arms across her chest and began to bounce up and down on the balls of her feet. She honestly wasn't sure if he would understand. She wanted to be with him—she did—but she couldn't just...dive head first into things like he did. What might seem like a tiny step to Stiles was a huge leap to her. "Allison's gonna get that look on her face."

Stiles blinked at her in confusion. "That...look?" he drawled out, like he was tasting the words. "What look?"

Charlie winced, knowing how much of a jackass she was about to turn into. "You know..." She waved her finger at her own face. "That smug look she gets when she's right. She totally called it—she knew I was into you before I did—and now that we're actually together, she's gonna be so...smug. And then she's going to ask me a ton of questions and she's going to get all excited and—and I'm just not sure how to deal with that yet."

Letting her shoulders sag, Charlie took another tiny step back, colliding with the row of shelves behind her, and looking vaguely like a child preparing for a scolding. Stiles, on the other hand, opened and closed his mouth a few times, searching for words that were apparently eluding him. "O—okay," Stiles said, waving his hands around as much as he could given the confined space. "Let me get this straight. We are together now."

"Yes," Charlie agreed with a bob of the head.

"You—" he pointed at Charlie "—you are happy that we got it together."

"Over the freaking moon," Charlie said with a small smile. "So to speak."

Stiles rolled his eyes at the obvious pun and barreled on. "And the only reason you don't want to announce over the P.A. system that we are, in fact, embroiled in some sort of romantic intrigue, is because Allison would—for a period of like five minutes—feel a little bit smug and get excited at the prospect of us being a couple."

It was Charlie's turn to gape slightly, searching for some kind of explanation that seemed even kind of socially acceptable. When she couldn't find one, Stiles narrowed his eyes at her, making her bristle. "What?" she demanded, throwing her hands in the air. "I can be petty! Is this news to you?" She lifted her hand and gave a long wave. "Hi, I'm Charlie. I'm afraid of emotional intimacy. And Furbys. They look like gremlins before they get wet."

"What is wrong with you?" Stiles practically shouted, gesturing at her wildly.

"Lots of stuff!" Charlie whisper-shouted back. "I don't floss nearly as much as I should, I insist on pronouncing 'croissant' in a French accent when I'm not speaking French, I bite my nails, I don't do my laundry until I've run out of clean underwear, I've got a thirty-something werewolf living in my subconscious, and, yeah, when it comes to relationships I have no clue what I'm doing! I'm cagey, I'm freaked out, I'm an emotional basket case!"

While she ranted at him, Stiles narrowed his eyes at her increasingly with an expression Charlie wasn't quite used to. But she was saying all right now. She was putting it all her cards out on the table. The only question was whether or not Stiles would want to stick around afterwards. "Yeah, I'm a train wreck," she muttered, running her hands through her hair and sighing loudly. "There's not sign of that changing any time soon. Hit the brakes now if you want out of this car."

"You just mixed train and car metaphors," he pointed out.

"Shut up!"

Stiles stared down at her for a few seconds, a crease forming between his eyebrows. "Charlie...why do you sound like you're listing reasons for me not to want to be with you?"

"Because there are lots of them," she muttered quietly. "Look, Stiles, I was serious when I said I don't know what I'm doing. I have no freaking clue. And that's when it's just me and you. If we tell everyone then it's me, you, Allison, Lydia, Scott, and that's on top of all of the murders and kanimas and this stuff with Derek. It's all going to get so complicated so fast...and this? I want it to be simple. I want it to be you and me. Just for a few days until...I don't know, until we figure out how this stuff is supposed to work. Because I want it to last a really, really long time."

His gaze had been steadily softening throughout her explanation, but once that last sentence left her lips, his eyes snapped to hers and he studied her face carefully. "You do?"

Charlie bit her lip and nodded slowly, looking up at him with eyes that were almost pleading. Honestly when she woke up this morning she had had no idea where this conversation with Stiles was supposed to go, but she had not expected this. She had not expected to actually spill her guts about all her fears and feelings and insecurities. Usually all of those things stayed neatly tucked away in a box, but here she was, blurting them all out. "Yeah, Stiles," she said, her voice suddenly low and harsh. She stared intently at her feet as she spoke, too scared to see what Stiles's reaction was. "I do. A lot. And I don't want to screw it up. I want to know what I'm doing with you. And trust me, if all my crazy is too much for you, I get it. You don't have to—"

She didn't have a chance to finish that sentence. Before she could get the words out Stiles's hand hooked under her chin, tilting it upwards, and covered her mouth with his. There was no hesitation in that kiss—no worry, no anxiety, none of it. Relief flooded through Charlie, along with all those other feelings she usually got when Stiles kissed her. His hands cupped her cheeks, holding her face close to his as their lips moved together. When he pulled back, he was looking at her like she was a complete and total idiot. "Charlie, do me a favor and stop saying stupid things." He planted one last kiss on her lips before taking a small step back. "You've got baggage," he said, throwing his hands in the air. "So what—that's fine. I'll...bwah, well I'll help you carry it. Then, who knows? We could sort through it, fold the socks, stow it in a neat and compact fashion, color-coordinate it...We could do that together. Maybe. If you want. Whatever you need."

The easy acceptance of everything she had just dumped on him made Charlie pause for a moment. "And you're okay with that?" she said, looking at him seriously. "You're okay with keeping it ourselves for a bit."

Stiles shrugged with a nonchalance that was at least partially genuine. "Yeah. Absolutely—yes. I mean I already told Scott, but—"

"Please, Scott doesn't count," she said, waving her hand dismissively. "I'm pretty sure the two of you have a weird mental bridge anyway."

Stiles let out a sigh and rubbed at the back of his head, glancing around the room like he was searching for what to say next. "Okay," he muttered to himself as much as to her. "Alright. So we...we keep it to ourselves for a little while. That's fine. That's good. That's cool." He scrunched up his face into a slightly pained expression, like he was brainstorming or something. "So, uh, so why don't...why don't we go to my house after school and practice today and we can...I don't know—we can research some of this craptastic kanima stuff. Just you and me. Stiles and Charlie. Charlie and Stiles. Doing what we usually do. Transitioning. Becoming...whatever it is that we are. How does that sound?"

He looked up at her with this oddly hopeful expression that simultaneously warmed her heart and made her feel kind of shitty for putting him through all this. "Great," she agreed immediately. "Perfect. That sounds—that sounds perfect."

"Great," he quipped. And then something changed in his expression. It wasn't bemused or befuddled or anything like that. It was sly—crafty even. "So," he drawled out, a tiny smirk appearing on his face. "Now that we've gotten you to stop spouting idiotic crap and we have something vaguely resembling a plan as to how we're going to work this out, I think it's about time that you kissed me."

Charlie blinked in surprise and made a face at him. "Excuse me?"

"This is the part where you kiss me," Stiles said as if it was the most obvious thing in the world. "I don't know if you noticed, but I—" he gestured at himself "—I was just incredibly understanding a few seconds ago. I'm just saying that I probably deserve some kind of reward or something."

"We literally just kissed a second ago," Charlie said, fighting the smile threatening to form.

"Correction," Stiles said, pointing at her almost accusingly. "I kissed you. You didn't kiss me. Am I supposed to be putting in all the effort here? That just doesn't seem fair—guys need to be romanced too."

"Guys need to be romanced too?" Charlie repeated in a skeptical tone. "Can I quote you on that one?"

"No, you can't. Now shut up and kiss me. Come on." He tapped a finger against his lips, looking at her with raised eyebrows. "Plant one right there."

Charlie rolled eyes and sighed, shooting him a withering look. "Fine," she bit out. "Fine, I'll kiss you."

"Great."

"But it's not because you told me to."

"Whatever you say," he drawled out in a tone that was almost patronizing.

"It's to get you to stop talking," she elaborated, a smirk pulling at the corners of her lips. "I'm kissing you to get you to shut the hell up."

"Don't care," Stiles shrugged. "The result's still the same. And make it a good one, Osw—"

The words died on his lips when her hands snaked around his neck and brought her face close to his. She didn't kiss him, though. Not yet. She let her lips hover close to his, a fraction of an inch away, and didn't move. She felt Stiles's spine stiffen slightly, his breath growing quicker and more ragged with anticipation, but still she held her position. After what felt like a lifetime, she pursed her lips, letting them lightly brush against his. They barely touched at all, but it was like a jolt of electricity shot through her body.

Charlie rocked back on her heels, pulling just far enough back to be able to see his expression. His eyes were still closed, and the rest of his features were arranged into an expression of surprise. When he finally opened his eyes again, all trace of humor was gone. He exhaled sharply and a uttered a single word. If you could call it a word.

"Whoa."

Charlie swallowed heavily and nodded in agreement. "Yup."

They stood there staring at each other for a moment, and then it was like they collided. Honestly, if Charlie took a step back she would probably be rolling her eyes at herself. I mean how cliché could you get? Two teenagers making out in a school storage closet? Real freaking original. But the Charlie Oswin of that specific moment really couldn't give a crap. Because the Charlie Oswin of that moment was kissing Stiles Stilinski, and that had a way of making you forget things. Hell, it could make you forget everything. And it could also make you completely and totally deaf to the school bell. But, as it turned out, there was one thing that was just too hard to ignore.

The door to the storage closet swung wide open, letting light fly in. Stiles and Charlie jumped apart, both of them reflexively throwing their hands over their faces as the light blinded them. Gradually, their eyes adjusted and they found themselves staring at something almost as bright and shining as the sun. They were staring at the grinning face of none other than Scott McCall.

"Hey, guys!" he chirped cheerfully. "What are you doing?"

A hand almost involuntarily clapped itself onto Charlie's face, partly to stifle the intense wave of laughter that was currently racking her body and partly to hide the bright red flush creeping up her neck and covering her face. She made an attempt to form a coherent sentence and actually, you know, say something, but neither her brain nor her body would let her. Nope. Hysterical laughter was apparently the route she was going to take. Not Stiles though. He had more than a few choice words to throw out there.

"Dude, seriously?" he growled, rounding on Scott. "Seriously? Did y—did you have to pick that moment? You couldn't wait five minutes or one minute or...or for any other moment in the history of the world?" He glared accusingly at his friend and let out a loud scoff, throwing his hands in the air in protest. "You know what, I call foul. I call friendship foul. Line—" he used his finger to draw an invisible line between them "—line in the sand—we're not friends anymore. You and me—" he gestured back and forth between the two of them "—done. Finito. Finished. Donzo. Friendship officially over."

"The school bell rang," Scott replied with an innocent shrug. "First period's starting. You're gonna be late for class."

"DO I LOOK LIKE I CARE THAT THE SCHOOL BELL RANG?!"

Stiles began muttering incoherent hate-speech, but that only made the grin on Scott's face grow wider until it had pretty much reached 'Cheshire Cat' status. How somebody who had apparently been stabbed last night by his girlfriend's grandfather could be so chipper was, quite frankly, beyond her. Scott's head turned in Charlie's direction, fixing her with that jubilant gaze. "Hey, Charlie!"

Charlie finally managed to stifle her laughter long enough to remove her hand from its position over her mouth and give him a half-hearted wave. "Hey, Scott," she muttered, giving a half-hearted wave. "How's it going?"

"It's going great," he laughed, bobbing his head at her. "It's just...a totally fantastic day."

And then the three of them just stood there in complete silence. Scott kept looking back and forth between Stiles and Charlie with this ridiculous expression on his face, despite the intensity with which Stiles was glowering at him. And Charlie...well she just felt super-uncomfortable. "Yeah..." Charlie drawled out, narrowing her eyes and glancing between the two boys. "I think I'm gonna go to class."

"Okay," Scott chirped. "See you there!"

Charlie gave him the strangest of looks and then began to move past him, but then Stiles's voice stopped her.

"Charlie, hold on a second."

Stopping in her tracks, Charlie slowly turned around, a wince covering her face as she anticipated what type of semi-embarrassing situation was waiting for her now. Stiles took a few steps towards her, glancing self-consciously back at Scott for a moment. He reached a hand in the direction of her face, making Charlie's eyebrows furrow in confusion. His thumb swiped against the skin right below her lip and he cleared his throat uncomfortably. "Your, uh, your lip gloss was a bit smudged."

At that point a high pitched squeak emanated from somewhere behind them. Both she and Stiles turned around to see Scott standing there, gripping the straps of his backpack tightly and his face contorted into an almost pained expression. Charlie's face heated up yet again, and she nervously tucked her hair behind her ears while Stiles just rolled his eyes and let out a loud groan. "I'm gonna kill him," he muttered bitterly, scratching at his forehead. "That's it—I'm just gonna freaking kill him. In a way that is both painful and creative. Your dad was in the coast guard, right? Is there a bazooka or something hidden in your basement?"

Charlie sighed heavily and let her eyes slip past Stiles for a moment. When they settled Scott, the floppy-haired wonder just waved cheerfully. She pressed her lips into a thin line and punched Stiles lightly in the shoulder. "Just be sure to wait till there aren't any witnesses. And use something more subtle than a bazooka—it's way too distinctive a murder weapon. I'll see you after your lacrosse practice."

"Y—yeah," Stiles stammered. "After practice."

With that she spun on her heel and began marching towards English class, her movements jerky and uncoordinated. She was just about to round the corner to an adjoining hallway when she heard Stiles's voice echoing against the metal of the lockers.

"ARE YOU FREAKING KIDDING ME?!"

Once again she was overtaken by the sudden and completely irrational urge to laugh hysterically. She clapped a hand over her mouth, but continued in the direction of English class. She practically jogged there, which apparently was quickly enough to get there before the lesson had actually started. Mr. Hobson was still busy getting the rest the class settled, so she did her best to slip seamlessly into her spot without anybody else noticing. Unfortunately for her, she was seated behind than none other that Allison Argent, one of the few people was likely to notice her late arrival.

No more than three seconds after she slid into her seat, Allison twisted around and looked at Charlie questioningly. "Hey," she chirped. But what was a basic greeting soon turned into something else. A small frown tugged at the corners of Allison's lips and she looked at Charlie questioningly. "What happened to your hair?"

On instinct Charlie's hands flew up, patting at her hair, only to find that it was a tangled mess. Birds might as well have started nesting in it. Great. Fantastic. She was suffering from the condition typically referred to as 'make out hair'. Time to come up with an excuse. And quick.

"Oh," she mumbled evasively, running her fingers through her unruly locks to bring them into some semblance of order. "I, uh, I drove to school with the windows open," she muttered quickly. "I guess it got a bit tangled."

In an extreme stroke of luck, Mr. Hobson chose that exact moment to begin the lesson. Charlie had never been so happy to have a teacher yell at her in her entire life. "Ms. Argent, Ms. Oswin," the man's perpetually bored-sounding voice drawled out. "The two of you can swap makeup tips after class. In the mean time, your attention would be appreciated."

At that, Allison turned back around to face the front of the class, allowing Charlie to let out a sigh of relief. Disaster averted. There would be no giggling. She was safe. Or at least she thought she might be up until the wonder twins skidded to a halt in the doorway of the classroom. Stiles still looked annoyed as hell and Scott still had that stupid grin on his face. Not even one of Mr. Hobson's carefully crafted insults could wipe it away.

In the end Stiles just rolled his eyes, grabbing hold of Scott's shoulders and practically pushing in friend in the direction of their seats. When he took his spot next to her, Charlie had to will herself not to look over at him. And she managed not to. For a while. And by 'a while' she meant about five minutes. When she finally did glance over in his direction, she found him already looking over at her. He waggled his eyebrows at her theatrically, making her bite her lip to keep from laughing.

That's pretty much how the rest of the day went. Stolen glances and hidden smiles. It was almost strange, that feeling of contentment that had settled in her chest. Charlie found herself feeling lighter for some reason—like some burden had been lifted. Objectively it was pretty ridiculous that she felt that way. They were still coping with so much—monsters, murderers, Lydia, chemistry tests looming in the future—it felt like she should be riddled with anxiety. But for now she wasn't. It might have been insanely selfish of her, but she wasn't. A weight had been removed from her shoulders and she was living in a little bubble. It was probably going to burst soon—the real world was still waiting for her—but for now she was just going to enjoy it.

Was this what it felt like to be in a relationship? I mean she didn't _feel_ any different. It wasn't like the sun was shining brighter or the birds were chirping. And she and Stiles definitely weren't going to turn into one of those sickeningly adorable couples like Allison and Scott were at the beginning. You know, feeding each other or staring longingly into each others' eyes. Or at least she hoped they wouldn't. She wasn't particularly good at being adorable. If anybody stared longingly into her eyes, she was probably going to crack up laughing.

Jesus, this whole 'new relationship' thing was causing her internal monologuing to get way out of control. She had almost run into more than a few people on her way through the lunch line. Hell, she had almost forgotten to get her serving of tater tots. Wow, this paradigm shift was definitely messing with her head.

Eventually Charlie managed to get it together enough to steer her way through the lunch room and in the direction of a free table. Finally she plopped down at a table nearer to the windows than usual. Over the course of the past couple of weeks the group of them had been slightly marginalized, being pushed further and further away from the center table while Meredith Edwards and her cardigan-wearing cronies dominated the sought-after table. Apparently that's what happened when all you and your two besties were branded as being completely nuts. Charlie honestly couldn't care less—her tater tots didn't taste any less delicious where she was sitting now—but it had begun to peeve Lydia more than a little bit. Not that the red-head would let it show.

Charlie dropped her tray on the table and dug out her French notes, skimming over them before the inevitable pop quiz that was looming in her immediate future as she shoved forkfuls of potato into her mouth. She didn't manage to get much studying in, though. Under two minutes later a shadow fell over her books. When she looked up she found standing over her none other than Scott McCall. And he still had that stupid smile on his face.

"Has you expression changed at all since this morning?" she demanded, waving her finger in the direction of his face. "Doesn't grinning like that start to hurt at some point?"

Scott didn't say anything. He just unslung the backpack from his shoulders and dropped it on the floor before sliding into the seat opposite her. He rested his elbows on the table and perched his head on his hands. And then he just kept smiling. Slowly, Charlie scrunched her face up into a perturbed expression. "Okay, seriously, dude, just say something already. You're starting to creep me out."

"So," he finally said, his voice oddly tight. "Last night was eventful."

"Yes," she agreed, nodding soberly. "I hear you got stabbed."

Scott's eyebrows furrowed slightly and he made a face at her. "That's not what I'm talking about."

"Ah," Charlie said popping a tater tot in her mouth. "But that's _I'm_ talking about."

"Charlie—"

"How are you doing?" she asked, trying to turn the conversation around.

"Okay, I guess," he mumbled back. "I'm handling it."

"Need any help?"

And then Scott gave her this weirdly knowing look—one she wasn't used to getting from him. "I know what you're doing."

Charlie let out a small snort and narrowed her eyes at him. "Tell me, Scott. What am I doing?"

"You're trying to take control of conversation," Scott replied simply.

"And why would I go and do something like that?"

At that point Scott just scoffed and raised his eyebrows in an expression that clearly spelled out, 'seriously?'. Scott settled back in his chair, and he still looked vaguely happy, but that ridiculous grin had finally faded a bit. And that's when she knew she wasn't going to be able to avoid it. Here it was. One in a long string of super-awkward conversations about feelings—the one type of conversation she was absolutely terrible at. Oh, well. It was going to happen sooner or later.

"Stiles is my best friend," Scott said, looking at Charlie meaningfully.

"So I've heard," Charlie replied, nodding a bit. She let out a small groan and scratched absently at his forehead. "So is this the part where I ask for your blessing or whatever? I'm really not clear on how all this is supposed to go. I mean is there a survey I have to fill out? Are you going to vet me? How's this supposed to go?"

"You think I know?" Scott snorted.

"Well you're the one who's been in a semi-functional relationship for almost six months," she said gesturing at him absently. "That's six months more than me. You must have learned something." Scott just made a face and shrugged causing Charlie to roll her eyes. "Come on—there's seriously nothing you want to know? God, this is almost disappointing. No questions? None?"

Scott just jerked his head to the side noncommittally. "Do you like him?"

"Nope," Charlie drawled out. "I just felt like making out so grabbed the closest guy I could find and dragged him into a closet."

Judging by the expression on Scott's face, he was not amused. Frustration was beginning to seep through. Hell, he kind of looked like he was pouting. Which meant that it was probably time to be serious. "Yes, Scott," Charlie answered, looking at him earnestly. "I like him. A lot. I have for a while now. You can pull that lie detector crap on me if you feel like you need to."

Then that grin cropped back up on his face, giving Charlie the distinct urge to smack it right off. "Oh, Jesus, you've got to stop looking at me like that!" she whined.

"Wha—look at you like what?!" Scott spluttered.

"Like I'm a cat in an adorable youtube video!" She swore heavily and ran her hands through her hair. "So what now?" she shrugged. "Do we get joint custody? I'll take Mondays and Wednesdays, you can have Tuesdays and Thursdays and we'll alternate Fridays and weekends. Again, I have no idea how this conversation is supposed to go."

Once again, Scott made a face and shrugged. "Just...just make him happy, okay."

At that Charlie let out a snort and shook her head. "You realize who you're talking to, right?" she demanded, raising her eyebrows at him. "I'm more likely to annoy the hell out of him."

And then Scott smiled again, but it was different from all those other times. Those times it had been almost psychopathic glee that took control of his face muscles. It was the smile of a guy who knew his friend had finally gotten to make out with a girl. This time...this time the smile was softer. More genuine. Earnest. Then he let out a light laugh and shook his head at her. "Charlie, I don't know if you've noticed, but you annoying the hell out of him...it makes him pretty happy."

As soon as the words left his mouth, Charlie blinked. She wasn't used to that kind of bluntness, especially when it came to emotional stuff. It was pretty much the first time Scott had managed to catch her off guard. Ever. And he knew it. He leaned in towards her. "Did you hear that?"

Charlie leaned in as well, glancing around conspiratorially before looking at him. "Hear what?" she shot back with a sarcastic whisper.

Scott smirked. "Your heart just skipped a beat."

Some girls might have blushed with embarrassment, but Charlie's brain had always had what she called 'faulty wiring'. She didn't blush. She gagged theatrically. "Ugh—seriously? Dude, shut up before you embarrass yourself. I knew you were cheesy but I didn't think you were lame."

"You know we're reading _Hamlet_ in English class," Scott shot back cheekily. "I'm pretty sure there's this quote about ladies and protesting..."

"You read _Hamlet_?" Charlie asked, looking at him curiously.

Scott opened and closed his mouth a few times, a slightly guilty expression crossing his face. "I read the Cliff Notes?" he mumbled evasively, the sentence coming out as a question more than anything else.

Charlie rolled her eyes and turned back to her meal, spearing some more potatoes with the prongs of her fork. "I'll make you a copy of my notes." Scott mumbled out an absent 'thank you', but Charlie shushed him, seeing Allison and Lydia heading in her direction, holding trays of food and talking animatedly. "Okay, you need to get the hell out of here. I haven't told Allison and Lydia yet and they will not know for one week. One full week. I don't care if Allison begs or starts crying or starts withholding...whatever there is that she might withhold—you will not tell her for one week. On pain of death you will not tell her."

"Got it," Scott said, giving her an awkward salute. "Stiles covered all that. Only he got a bit more creative with the 'on pain of death' bit."

"I plan on feeding your decomposing corpse to the wolves at the zoo," she deadpanned. "I'm a big fan of irony."

A look of alarm crossed Scott's face and he stared at her like she was a total nutcase. Which, to be fair, was probably an accurate assessment. "He wasn't that creative," Scott muttered almost fearfully. Charlie just shrugged casually, making the wince he was wearing deepen until it was etched into his features. "I think I'll go now."

Then it was Charlie's turn to grin, only hers probably turned out more creepy than his. Scott slowly slid out of his seat, keeping his eyes on her the whole time, almost like he was afraid she would lash out at him. It was a lovely little farce and she appreciated it. But then, once he turned to actually, properly leave, Charlie remembered something.

"Hey, Scott, wait a second," she called after him. He stopped and turned back to face her, as small frown on his face. "Charlie reached for the bag slung over the back of her chair and dug around inside until she found that bag of Nacho Cheese Doritos she had gotten from the vending machine. She tossed them at Scott and he caught them easily, looking at her with an expression of confusion. "Just give those to him. He'll know what it means."

Scott let out a light snort. "You guys have inside jokes already," he said, shaking his head at her in a way that was almost patronizing. "That's adorable."

"Oh my God," Charlie practically shouted, throwing her hands in the air in frustration. "If you don't leave right now I'm going to punch you so hard in the face your jaw line's gonna be even. I'll do it—I've punched somebody at school before. You don't want to test me."

Scott held his hands up and began backing away slowly. "Okay," he said in a placating tone. "But for future reference he prefers Cool Ranch."

At that Charlie shot him her best 'melt your face off' glare. But apparently it had lost its impact, because he just gave her a wave and darted off to the other end of the cafeteria. The timing of the whole thing was almost perfect. About fifteen seconds after Scott left his seat, Lydia and Allison appeared at the table. And for some reason Lydia did not look happy. Though then again there were plenty of things to be upset about lately.

"Unbelievable," Lydia trilled. "I mean freaking unbelievable!"

"Yup," Allison said, nodding her head in placid agreement. "So I've heard."

Lydia rolled her eyes at Allison's lack of enthusiasm and slammed her tray down on the table so hard it made Charlie jump in her seat. Which, in turn, ensured that she smeared a healthy helping of ketchup across her face. She grabbed a napkin and began wiping it off while Lydia went on one of her patented rants. Charlie was actually pretty glad to hear the vitriol spilling out of those perfectly glossed lips. It was a lot better than finding her crying in the parking lot. She thought about broaching the topic, but she knew what would happen. Lydia would brush her off. The moment was over. Charlie would have to wait for another breakdown to get any actual information out of the girl, as terrible as that might sound.

"I mean the whole thing is completely ridiculous," the redhead continued to grumble.

"What's completely ridiculous?" Charlie mumbled, looking between the two girls.

Lydia turned to Charlie and studied her carefully, a small crease forming on her forehead. "Well for starters there's your eyebrows," she said, waving her finger in Charlie's direction. "It looks like you've got two of those fuzzy caterpillars living on your face." Charlie just shrugged and waggled her eyebrows theatrically, making Lydia scoff loudly. "Seriously, Charlie, just pluck them or wax them or something. The fact that you've got to study for a history test does not mean you get to ignore basic hygiene."

At that point Lydia looked like she was about to go on one of her overly enthusiastic rants, but Allison answered first, heading her off. "Meredith Edwards is throwing a party," she sighed out, lightly massaging her temples. Lydia had probably been 'discussing' the party for quite some time.

"Okay," Charlie drawled, opening up her fruit cup. "And this is significant because..."

"The e-vites went out on Monday," Allison replied.

"Huh," Charlie mused quietly. "I guess my spam filter is doing its job then."

At that, the wince etched into Allison's face deepened slightly, letting Charlie know that she had just said something horribly, horribly wrong. She gulped down the food in her mouth and furrowed her eyebrows a little, silently asking what Allison was talking about. Then about half a second later a tiny explosion told her exactly what Allison was talking about.

"Unfortunately, Charlie," Lydia said snappishly, "the effectiveness of your spam filter has yet to be tested. You didn't see the e-vite because you didn't get one. None of us did."

"Even better," Charlie said with a shrug.

And now they had reached the point in the conversation where Lydia looked at Charlie like she was crazy or stupid or both. Her mouth dropped open and her nose twitched a little bit as she stared down the brunette, who was still idly chomping on her lunch. Allison just let out a resigned but frustrated sigh, rolling her eyes a bit at the chaos she knew was about to ensue.

"Is there a disconnect between your brain and your mouth?" Lydia demanded, using her thumb and forefinger to flick at Charlie's temple. "Have you suffered some sort of traumatic head injury? How are you so dismissive of this clearly pointed exclusion of the three of us?"

"Because I wouldn't want to go in the first place," Charlie said, shaking her head a bit. "I kind of hate Meredith Edwards and going to one of her parties would be absolutely miserable. Plus, who even sends out invitations to parties anymore anyway? I thought all the cool kids were supposed to have some sort of magical radar that made them gravitate in the direction of parties."

"Who cares if you don't want to go?!" Lydia spluttered. "It's not like I want to go either. Meredith's house smells like mothballs and soup. I went there once when I was twelve for one of those stupid group projects teachers seem to insist on using."

Charlie blinked at the girl in confusion. "So why does it matter that she didn't invite us if we never intended to go?"

And then Lydia _really_ looked at Charlie like she was a total nutcase. "Um, it's the principle of the thing," she scoffed.

"Okay," Charlie said, waving a fork at the girl. "You never wanted to go. You just wanted to be able to reject the invitation in the manner to which you are accustomed."

"Yes!"

"Look, can we just talk about something else, please," Allison sighed. She had apparently been quite exhausted by this vein of conversation. Charlie was coming in on the tail end of the rant.

"Um, no," Lydia said, glancing back and forth between the two other girls with an air of frustration. "Are you guys seriously going to do nothing about this? It's a power play! Meredith Edwards is angling at—"

"At the center lunch table," Charlie finished for her. "I get it. But I was never going to get an invite. I sort of threatened her a few weeks back. Physical violence was implied." That earned her the most scathing of looks. "What?" she demanded, throwing her hands in the air. "She was being a complete bitch!"

Lydia's eyes fell shut and her jaw twitched before she managed to form a coherent sentence. She exhaled sharply before opening her eyes and shooting Charlie a withering glare. "Why am I still surprised when you threaten people?"

"I sure as hell don't know," Allison snorted. "She's threatened pretty much everybody in our grade. Pretty much exclusively with physical violence. Honestly I think her using implied physical violence is a sign of progress."

A smile of appreciation formed on Charlie's face and she reached across the table, grabbing Allison's hand. "Thank you," she said with an almost comical degree of sincerity. "It means so much that you noticed."

Allison smirked back and wrinkled her nose. "How could I not," she replied.

Lydia just looked back and forth between the pair with an expression of mild disgust. "I will never understand the two of you. Now can someone pay attention and help me figure out what we're going to do?"

Charlie blew out a long breath and stared absently at the ceiling, feigning an expression of intense concentration. "I could egg her house," she suggested idly.

"Ah, petty vandalism," Lydia drawled out, smiling radiantly at Charlie. "The Oswin specialty."

"You know it!"

And then Lydia gave her this look—a long hard look featuring narrowed eyes and a curious expression. It made Charlie fidget a bit in her seat. It was like the girl was trying to burrow inside her mind. "Why are you looking at me like that?" she demanded quietly.

Lydia frowned slightly. "What did you do differently this morning?"

That one little sentence made Charlie choke on her tater tots. The way it had been phrased was light and casual, but it was definitely a loaded statement. Charlie did her best to seem normal—which for her meant sarcastic and a wee bit snide—and cleared her throat. "What do you mean?"

"I mean did you use a little blush?" she prompted. "Did you get a new moisturizer? New shampoo? I mean I know you haven't brushed your hair but it could still have a nicer base. Either way, something's different." She cocked her head to the side and looked at Charlie curiously. "Are you sure you didn't use blush? You kind of look like you're glowing, actually."

Oh, crap. Why did Charlie have to be friends with such damn perceptive people? She needed to surround herself with stupid, dull people who couldn't pull stuff like this. If she hadn't had the capacity to spin bullshit at a moment's notice, she would have been in a lot of trouble a lot earlier than this. "I studied on the back porch yesterday," she lied quickly. "I might have gotten a bit of a sunburn."

At that point Lydia scoffed and rolled her eyes. "What have I told you about wearing moisturizer with at least 30SPF? Sun damage is a real problem, especially for some as pasty as you. You're going to end up looking like the crypt keeper by the time you turn thirty."

Charlie just mumbled silently in agreement and let the conversation continue, veering back in the direction of that upstart Meredith Edwards. But Charlie still felt like something had changed. The looks Lydia kept shooting at her remained slightly pointed—like she was studying Charlie. Stealthily, of course, but stealthily was even worse than blatant. If she was loud about something it meant she was impatient and didn't care all that much about it in the long term. If she was quiet about it...well than that meant she was going for the long play. She would sit back and observe until she put the pieces together.

Oh, well. Hopefully it would take her a few days.

When the school day finally ended, Charlie went straight home. She had about an hour or so before Stiles would be done with lacrosse practice, which meant she had about an hour and a half to prepare herself. God, that sounded so stupid. 'Prepare herself'? She had gone over to Stiles's house a thousand times and not once did she ever feel compelled to 'prepare herself'. It must be part of the whole 'adjustment period' thing. That had to be the reason. She couldn't think of any other reason why she would find herself in front of the mirror with a pair of tweezers, yanking the stray hairs out of her eyebrows.

Before leaving, Charlie looked around, trying to think of what she could bring with her. They were researching kanima stuff, after all. That was what they had agreed to do, right? Research? And research meant that you needed research materials. Problem was, she didn't have much of that anymore. When it came to hunting down the alpha, her 'weird shit' file was filled with notes and papers and speculation. But after everything with Peter, she had ditched all that stuff. It wasn't relevant anymore. Since then, though...it had stayed pretty empty. She had had so much other craziness going on in her life, actually figuring things out hadn't been much of a priority. Still, though, she grabbed that almost empty binder and shoved it in her messenger bag before climbing in her car and taking off down the street.

The entire way to Stiles's house, Charlie felt a bit of anticipation building up inside her. On one hand she hated it. It felt like she didn't have full control over herself, and she hated that. But on the other hand she was excited. Like fuzzy feeling in the pit of her stomach type of excited. Because for once not knowing what the hell was going to happen didn't come with fatal consequences. It could be something good that was waiting for her on the other side of this looking glass.

When Charlie pulled up in front of the Stilinski residence, she sat in her car for a few moments to steel her nerves. The blue Jeep was proudly parked in the driveway and his dad's police cruiser was nowhere to be seen. Okay. Alright. This was it—this was the step. She wasn't sure why she was so nervous. It didn't make any sense. I mean she had just spent the morning making out with the guy in a supplies closet, but this...this was different. This was her and Stiles...being her and Stiles. Only different. And as exciting as different was, it scared her.

Charlie blew out a long breath and tapped her thumb against the steering in a way that was almost pathological. That is until she realized that Stiles usually did the exact same thing when he was nervous about something. She was picking up on his habits. Immediately she clenched her hands into fists and placed them in her lap. Finally, she summoned up the courage to look into the rearview mirror at her own reflection. Her eyebrows did actually look a bit better now.

Shaking her head, Charlie forced her thoughts back in order. "Suck it up, Oswin," she said, glowering at her reflection. But that still didn't work. So she counted down from ten.

Once she hit zero, Charlie wrenched open the door to her car and clambered out. It was a rule. Once you hit zero you had to do exactly what you were afraid of doing. No exceptions. And she certainly wasn't going to start making exceptions now.

Finally, Charlie forced herself to clamber out of the car. She slung her bag over her shoulder and marched across the street, sucking in a deep breath as she did so. Reaching up a hand, she knocked on the door three times and then folded her arms across her chest. Almost immediately she heard the sounds of Stiles's approach. There was a crash followed by a bang leading to yet another crash which all culminated in this weird scampering noise that seemed to grow closer to the door. Soon enough the front door was yanked open to reveal a slightly sweaty, out of breath Stiles. He made sure to straighten up, and leaned against the doorframe as casually as possible. Which wasn't very.

"H—hey," he coughed out, seeming oddly out of breath.

Charlie pressed her lips together and nodded at him awkwardly. "Hey."

Then Stiles smiled that stupid, adorable smile of his. "Hey."

Charlie bit down on her lip and leaned in a bit. "I think this is the part where you invite me in?" she muttered quietly.

"R—right—come on in," Stiles stammered out, stepping out of her way and waving a door, indicating for her to enter. "Entrez-vous."

At that moment Stiles made a face—a 'I can't believe I just randomly started talking in French' face—and slammed his fist to his forehead, making Charlie bite back a smile. She silently stepped through the threshold and glanced around. She had been in the house plenty of times, but there was something...neater about it this particular time. Everything seemed...neater. And then she realized what had happened. Stiles cleaned up for her. She wasn't the only one here who was anxious.

"So, uh, research," Stiles laughed out, trailing behind her. "That's—that's what we're doing here. Research."

"Um, yeah," Charlie muttered, laughing a bit herself. "That—that is technically what we agreed upon doing."

"Right," Stiles repeated, nodding at her and laughing a bit. "So, uh, so follow me. Or suivez-moi."

Charlie bit her lip to fight back the smile threatening to form. "We've known each other for a while, Stiles," she smirked. "I think you can step away from using the formal 'vous' form. I'm cool with you using 'tu' instead."

At that, Stiles rolled his eyes and for a second everything felt totally normal. "Ugh," he muttered. "You will literally take any sentence and turn it into a semantic argument, won't you?"

Charlie grinned back widely. "Misuse of the word 'literally'," she pointed out, punching him lightly in the shoulder.

Finally having had enough, Stiles let out a semi-frustrated grunt and stomped up the stairs. Charlie lingered for a while in the entryway, wondering what exactly she was supposed to do in this type of scenario. It was actually a little bit rude if she thought about it—him abandoning her at the front of his house like that. She was just beginning to contemplate whether or not she should be offended—or act offended as the case may be—when Stiles's disembodied head appeared at the top of the stairs. "Well?" he called down to her. "Are you coming or not?"

Charlie fought back the tiny smile pulling at the corners of her lips and let out a loud, theatrical scoff. "Fine, I'm coming," she drawled out. "Don't get your panties in a twist."

She heard him grumbling something indistinctive under his breath as she trudged up the stairs, following him to his room. Honestly the whole thing had a bit of a surreal feeling to it. She had been in Stiles's room plenty of times before, studying or discussing werewolf theories or just plain talking. But now it felt odd—it was the same and different all at once. It still had the same posters and that same little collection of Star Wars of figurines in the corner, but it was lacking a few things as well. Namely the mismatched socks and dirty T-shirts that were typically strewn across the floor at random intervals. She got the sneaking suspicion that if she opened the closet door, she would be buried under an avalanche.

But the appearance of the room wasn't the only thing that felt different. Charlie's stomach still felt like it was twisting into knots, but that wasn't necessarily a bad thing. It was still a strange sensation though. As stable as things were between her and Stiles, they still _felt_ like they were up in the air. And right now it occurred to her that the last time she and Stiles had spoken, they were making out in a closet. But for now the two of them just stood there, staring at each other and smiling awkwardly. Again.

A strange, low whine emitted from Charlie and she shook her head. "Oh, man, we really suck at this," she said with a wince. "Like, seriously. I'm trying to think of a situation where I was more socially awkward than I am in this exact moment, and I can't think of one! There's nothing. Like not even a single, solitary thing!"

"Really?" Stiles demanded skeptically. "You sure about that? Because I seem to recall one or two instances where you were seriously—"

"Stiles!"

"Ugh, I know," Stiles groaned in response, scratching absently at his forehead. "It's like I'm actively thinking of ways for this to be less weird, but me thinking about how to make it less weird is making more weird than it was in the first place." He blew out a long breath and planted his hands on his hips, staring at her questioningly. "So, what do we do now?" he asked, shrugging at her. "Do we just...I don't know, wait for it to be normal?"

"I guess," Charlie said with a shrug. "I mean, what else can we do?"

Stiles made a face indicating that he had one or two other suggestions, but Charlie let out a scandalized scoff and smacking him in the chest, making him throw his arms up in surrender. After that look of slight disappointment crossed Stiles's face, but he nodded in agreement. Honestly, she was pretty disappointed too. But she couldn't think of another way to go about it. They couldn't just make out and then grin awkwardly at each other for forever, losing they're capacity to speak altogether. It wasn't sustainable. There wasn't really a way for them to fast forward through the awkward transition phase. They had to trudge through it. So they did. Which meant that they researched. A lot.

But even though they actually researched didn't mean that they didn't take a break like every two minutes to shoot each other fleeting glances. It wasn't clear how much work they were actually

The arrangement went thusly. Stiles pillaged the internet for any possible new information while Charlie looked through his existing notes, seeing if anything he had accumulated over the past couple of weeks had any relevance, while Stiles scoured the internet looking for any possible information on any mythological creature known as the 'kanima'. At first she thought it was her job that was hard. While she was freaking out about Peter and what the hell he was doing in her head, Stiles was looking up mythological lizard creatures. All mythological lizard creatures. Every single one.

Seven articles on the basilisk. Three articles on Echidna, a few on the Hydra, and one on the Lamia which was apparently a half-woman, half-snake monster that ate children. Charlie outright skipped all the articles on the Loch Ness Monster, not that she would admit that to Stiles. There was one that actually looked at least kind of promising. Apparently Islamic mythology had this creature known as a djinn. They could alternate between human and serpentine forms. That seemed kind of relevant, right? Well, it wasn't. The djinn were creatures who could exercise free will. That didn't quite fit with the whole 'unwitting serial killer' thing Derek had gone on and on about. There were literally dozens of articles to look over, all of them with slightly erratic notes scribbled into the margins. Damn, it was lucky she was a speed reader, otherwise she wouldn't even come close to making a dent in the stuff. But still it was bust after bust after bust. Until she saw something she couldn't just skim over.

"Chupacabra?!" she whined. Charlie looked up from where she was lying on his bed, papers spread out in front of her. He pushed himself back from his computer, a defensive expression on his face, and folded his arms across his chest. But Charlie wasn't going to be swayed by any scandalized looks. "Seriously, dude, Chupacabra? That's seriously scraping the bottom of the barrel here. Like there have got to be splinters under your fingernails."

"Wha—I was operating off of very limited information!" Stiles shot back. "I was casting a wide net!"

"And did that wide net happen to catch a mermaid?" she shot back. "I mean they have scales—we might as well throw them in the ring too!"

Stiles rolled his chair back a little bit further and raised his eyebrows pointedly. "Your sarcasm becomes more pronounced when you're intellectually frustrated." Charlie let out a small grunt and glowered in his direction, but that just made him smile widely. "You know you look kind of cute when you're trying to set me on fire with your mind. You get this—" he pointed at his forehead "—this little crease between your eyebrows."

All of the sudden a book went flying through the air—a book that she may or may not have thrown. Stiles managed to dodge the book, flailing his arms and almost falling out of his chair in the process. When he finally righted himself, he flashed her a grin. "Why do I get the feeling I'm going to have to improve my reflexes if I'm going to survive this whole thing?"

"There are plenty of reasons for you to improve your reflexes, Stiles," she sighed, flipping idly through some more papers. "Lacrosse, lizard monsters—"

"Projectile books," he supplied, spinning around in his chair.

Charlie had to bite back a smile. She liked the way Stiles couldn't stop moving. Even when everything was perfectly calm, he just couldn't stay still. He was constantly tapping his pen or pushing himself around in his chair. It might seem counterintuitive, but it really calmed her down. The fact that somebody could maintain such a strange sort of enthusiasm in the face of, well, everything, made her feel a bit hopeful. But then she looked down at the piles of useless paper she was lying on top of and let out a groan, letting her head fall against the surface.

"No luck, huh," Stiles's voice interjected.

Blowing out a long breath, Charlie lifted her head from the paper. A bit of the paper stuck to her face and she yanked it off, crumpling it into a paper ball and chucking it across the room. "Yup," she sighed out dejectedly. "Norse mythology, Greek mythology, Islamic mythology—there is literally nothing here that remotely resembles what we're looking for. And there's definitely nothing about a kanima anywhere here." She ran her hands through her hair and looked up at him questioningly. "How about you?"

"Nothing," he said, throwing his hands in the air. "I've searched every database I can think of than the only 'kanima' I can find is a freaking were-jaguar from South America. Overall, not that helpful. Maybe Derek is making the whole thing up. Maybe he doesn't know what it is."

"Why would he lie?" Charlie asked, shrugging a bit.

"I don't know—to make himself look impressive," Stiles spluttered. "Big strong Derek also happens to be wise and knows exactly what we're dealing with. I bet he's making it up."

"Yeah," Charlie snorted, rolling her eyes at his indignation. "I bet he airbrushes his abs on in the morning too."

The look she received in response was not appreciative. Charlie bit her lip and drummed her fingers over the paper, trying to think of another possible option. "Okay," she muttered to herself. "Okay, okay, um, so how are we doing with the bestiary? Is there any progress on that front?"

"Huh—I wish," Stiles scoffed. "Not only is it all written in archaic Latin, but it's that kind of script monk's use that's pretty much impossible to read. Plus there's like seven hundred pages of the stuff. Even if we do come up with a way to translate the damn thing it'll take forever to even find the section on the kanima—if there even is one." He grabbed his laptop and placed it on his lap, wheeling backwards until he was positioned next to her at the bed. "I mean look at this stuff," he said, gesturing at the screen as he called up the files. "Each letter looks like they doodled a tree or something. I mean who has the time to do that."

Charlie looked up at him quizzically. "They were monks, Stiles," she drawled out. "Time was pretty much the only thing they had in excess." And then she stared at the screen, an intense look of concentration on her face at the wheels began to turn.

"Oh, I know that look," Stiles said, snapping his fingers and pointing at her. "That's you're 'I have an idea' look. Do you have an idea?"

"Maybe," Charlie mused absently. "Can I see your computer for a second?"

Stiles removed the computer from his lap and placed it in front of her before pushing back from the bed and spinning around so he could watch her work. Charlie began to click around frantically, trying to get all the necessary programs up and running. "Wow, Stiles," she muttered, never taking her eyes off the screen. "The porn collection you've got here is seriously impressive."

"I knew you were going to make that joke," Stiles said immediately, pointing at her. "You officially have not freaked me out. I totally knew you were going to do that. No freaking out here. None whatsoever. Nope. Nada."

"You know I'd be more likely to believe you if you stopped repeating yourself," Charlie smirked, shooting him a devious glance. At that Stiles made a face at her that was less than mature and she looked back down at the screen. She could kind of see Stiles in the background. At first he just pushed himself around the room in his chair, sometimes craning his neck to try and get a look at his keyboard. And then he got up and began pacing slowly, still trying to get a look at what she was doing. She could have just ended his misery and told him outright, but Stiles trying to be stealthy always ended up being equal parts adorable and hilarious. So she let him stew. Until he stretched his neck out so far he almost lost his balance and fell. "You know you can just ask me what I'm doing, right?" she said, glancing up at him.

Stiles let out a small laugh and scratched absently at the back of his neck. "You, uh, you looked a bit busy." He stood there for s few moments before jumping on the bed next to her, forcing her to grab hold of the computer lest it go flying to the floor. "Okay," he said, leaning in closer than was probably necessary, not that she minded. "So what are we doing?"

"Reverse image search," Charlie replied quickly.

"Reverse image search," Stiles repeated slowly, like he was tasting the words. "Okay. And that helps us how?"

"Well it's like you said," Charlie explained. "Each of these letters looks like a tiny picture, right? So we take those pictures and arrange them into an image. Splice out all the individual letters, arrange them to form the word 'kanima', and then—"

"Then do a reverse image search and see if the word 'kanima' pops up anywhere in the document," Stiles finished for her.

"Exactly," Charlie chirped. "Danny taught me how to do it. We might not be able to translate the damn thing, but at least we'll know where to look."

And then Stiles just stared at her. For a while Charlie tried to ignore it—she had Stiles's outdated version of Photoshop up and was doing her damndest to cobble together a decent looking rendition of the word 'kanima'—but then she couldn't anymore. It was making her stomach jump a bit. Then, when she couldn't quite take it anymore she looked up at Stiles with an expression of annoyance. "Okay, why the hell are you looking at me like—"

Before she could get the sentence out, Stiles ducked down and kissed her. Almost immediately her lips pressed back—it was involuntary, really. When the two of them drew apart, her eyes stayed closed for a moment and she instinctively licked her lips. "Um, why did you do that?" she mumbled quietly.

"Other than the obvious reasons?" he said with a snort. "Because you're freaking brilliant."

"Well then we have a problem," she smirked back cheekily. "I'm brilliant all the time. If you kiss me every time I'm brilliant the both of us are going to end up with some seriously chapped lips."

Stiles narrowed his eyes and stared out into space, like he was trying to decipher the secrets of the universe. "Yeah...I'm trying to see the downside you that you seem to be implying exists with that particular scenario and I'm just—I'm not seeing it. Nope. Pretty sure it doesn't exist." He went in for another kiss, lips puckered and everything, but before he could close the gap between them Charlie planted her hand on his face and pushed him back.

"Seriously, dude?" she said, raising her eyebrows at him.

"What?!" he spluttered.

"I am on the verge of making a potentially ground-breaking step here, and you're...I don't know, you're distracting me. It's distracting." She exhaled sharply and tucked her hair behind her ears, shaking her head a little bit. "This whole thing, it's just very...very distracting." And then the biggest shit-eating grin split across Stiles's face. Which in turn made her roll her eyes. Hard. "Ugh, what is that face about?" she demanded, smacking him in the shoulder.

Stiles frowned in mock confusion and shrugged. "Nothin'," he drawled out. "It's just that you have the most laser-focused brain out of pretty much anybody else I know, and you find me distracting. I find that noteworthy. It's 'of note' as they say."

"I will kill you with my mind."

"Hey, you're the one that said it," he smirked.

Charlie narrowed her eyes into slits and growled at him. But apparently her ability to intimidate had plummeted dramatically, because nothing seemed to make him stop with the stupid smiling. Nope. No. She was putting the blinders on. She turned back to the computer screen and did her best to ignore the lanky idiot sprawled out next to her. Which was especially difficult when his fingers managed to wind their way into her hair. But Stiles was right about one thing. She did have a laser focused brain. And as difficult as it was, she could ignore it.

After about fifteen more minutes, Charlie managed to cobble together an image that at least looked kind of viable. She took a few moments to download the appropriate software and then she opened up the bestiary, holding her breath as that stupid freaking rainbow wheel circled and circled. It was like the freaking thing was mocking her—taunting her with the possibility of success or failure. Then a weird, upbeat chirping noise emanated from the machine and the text shifted, leaving one little blue highlighted square over the word 'kanima'. Charlie blinked at the computer a few times, making sure she was actually seeing what her eyes were telling her brain she was seeing. And yup. There it was. Spelled out plain as day.

"Holy crap," she whispered, staring at the screen. "That worked. That actually worked."

"H—yeah, it did!" Stiles exclaimed, staring at the screen. He sat up on the bed, looking between her and the screen with an expression of excitement. "What are you waiting for—print the freaking thing!"

Charlie selected all of the pages in the 'chapter' or whatever and hit the print button. Soon enough they were being spat out of the printed on the other side of the room. Stiles immediately jumped to his feet and sprinted towards the machine. As each paper was printed, he snatched it up and started reading, his eyes darting across the text and squinting at it like he was magically going to acquire the ability to read archaic Latin. "Well I see the word kanima in here like ten times," he mused absently. "We definitely found the right passage."

"Still can't read it though," Charlie sighed. She began clicking wildly closing down all the windows. "It's frustrating as hell, you know? It's like it's right there in front of us but it's not...it's not letting us see it. It's coy. We've got a coy freaking clue."

"But we're half way there," Stiles said happily. "It's closer than we were yesterday."

Charlie jerked her head to the side noncommittally. He was right. They were just a little bit closer to an answer. And that was good, but they were still so freaking far. She had this nagging feeling in the pit of her stomach and it was telling her that something was going to go horribly, horribly wrong. But there Stiles was, grinning at the papers like a kid who had just been given a freaking lollipop. That sort of enthusiasm couldn't not rub off on you.

Smiling a little bit to herself, Charlie's eyes travelled back to the computer screen and when they did something caught her attention. There, in the upper right hand corner, was a file labeled 'The Master Plan'. "Stiles?" Charlie said, glancing up at him curiously.

"Yup," he replied. But the reply was absent, like he wasn't really paying attention. All his attention was focused on those papers.

"What's the 'Master Plan'?"

What happened next was a little bit bizarre. All of the sudden Stiles seemed to freeze. His eyes went a bit wide and his muscles stiffened a bit. Then, without any warning whatsoever, he let those precious, precious papers fly and practically sprinting across the room. Charlie looked at him with an expression of alarm. "What the—"

Before she could even get the words out, Stiles skidded to a stop right in front of her, collapsing on his knees next to the bed and slamming the laptop shut. Sitting on the floor, he leaned back against the side of the bed, panting a bit. "Dude, what the hell?" Charlie exclaimed, giving him a quizzical look. "Was _that_ your porn collection?"

"Wha—no!" Stiles panted out, shaking his head at her. "No, it wasn't."

"Okay..." Charlie drawled out, shaking her head at him. "Then why did you just suffer a mini-seizure or something?"

Stiles let out a reluctant sigh and winced, running his hands down his face. And then he looked up at her with a slightly embarrassed expression. "Those...those, uh, those were _our _plans."

"Our plans?" Charlie said, furrowing her eyebrows a bit. "What do you mean 'our plans'?"

Then Stiles rolled his eyes at her, like he thought she was being intentionally obtuse. "You know...plan. _The_ plans. The...the first date plans. The surprise plans...which are now slightly less of a surprise."

He scratched absently at the back of his neck and avoided eye contact with her, instead staring out across his room. Something which, quite frankly, she was fine with. It meant he couldn't see the flush creeping up her neck. "You, uh, you know you don't have to do that, right?" she mumbled. "I don't need anything big or fancy. It's totally—"

"Shut up!"

Charlie's mouth snapped shut and she raised her eyebrows. Stiles just glanced back up at her with a look in his eye that somehow managed to be simultaneously mischievous and sincere. "I am going to romance the crap out of you, Charlotte Evelyn Oswin," he said, nodding at her. "Now that we are dating I'm gonna sweep you off your freaking feet. Which won't be difficult because, let's face it, you're powers of coordination are kind of lacking."

"Oh, really," Charlie said archly. "And what makes you think we're dating?"

Stiles blinked in confusion, opening and closing his mouth a couple of times. "'C—cause," he stammered. "You know...the kissing and stuff? I was under the impression that was a fairly good indicator."

"In general, yes," Charlie said, bobbing her head a bit. "But right now there's one little sticking point."

"And what's that?"

A theatrical wince covered her face and shrugged. "Maybe the fact that you haven't actually asked me out yet."

Almost immediately Stiles's eyes fell shut and he got this expression on his face like he was mentally berating himself. Then, in a flurry of action, he spun around so that he was still sitting on the floor but his arms were propped up on the bed. He perched his head on his folded hands, his face inches from his face. "Charlie," he said in an incredibly serious voice. "Will you go out with me? On a date?"

Charlie blew out a long breath and looked up at the ceiling, scrunching her face up into an expression of extreme concentration. "Um, what's this?" Stiles asked, waving a finger in his face. "What's this look?"

"I'm considering your offer," Charlie replied. "A girl's got to weigh her options." Judging by the scowl on his face, Stiles was not amused. And, as per usual, his frustration entertained her to no end. "Yes, Stiles," she said with a light snort. "I will go out with you."

And, yet again, they found themselves staring at each other with idiotic grins on their faces. He removed one of his hands from under his chin and slid it across the surface of the bed until it linked with one hers. They laced their fingers together and squeezed tightly. But then Charlie let out a sigh and bit her lip. "How are we going to do this, man?"

Stiles frowned and shook his head in confusion. "What do you mean?"

"I mean logistically," Charlie continued, tapping a finger against the top of his closed laptop for emphasis. "Like how are we going to be as a couple? Because I swear if we become one of those cutesy boyfriend-girlfriend pairs that have adorable nicknames for each other, I will end the relationship immediately. On principle, I will end it."

"Well that's too bad," Stiles drawled out sarcastically. "I was already field-testing nicknames. It was a tossup between 'pookie-bear' and 'sweetie-pie'."

"You think I would ever allow myself to be called 'pookie-bear'?" Charlie snorted.

"Oh, no way," Stiles corrected. "You would be calling _me _'pookie bear'."

"I'm serious, man," Charlie scoffed, smacking him in the shoulder. "It's like...as much as I like Scott and Allison together, I don't want to become them, you know?" She pinched the bridge of her nose in frustration, trying to find the right words. "Look, Stiles, you've been my best friend for a long time now. I don't want 'best friend' to just get replaced by 'boyfriend' and have that be that. I feel like I'd be losing something. It's just...I want us to be...more than what we were, but I don't want any of that stuff we had before to change. I want to keep kicking your ass at video games and I want you to keep telling me what an idiot I am. Does that make any sense?"

Stiles's hand that wasn't busy holding hers began to fidget a bit, his fingers drumming frantically against the bed. "Yeah, that makes sense," he murmured, bobbing his head a bit. "I don't want any of that to change either. There's no way I'm ever gonna stop telling you when you're being an idiot." He readjusted himself, scooting towards her and leaning a bit further in over the bed. And then he stared at her with...with this look, those wide, genuine eyes of his boring into hers. "Who says anything has to change. We can be exactly what we were before. Except, you know, we make out sometimes. Or frequently—I prefer frequently."

Charlie bit her lip, considering his words for a moment. And then a tiny smile pulled at the corners of her lips. "Okay. I can work with that."

Stiles's face brightened visibly. "Yeah?"

"Yeah," Charlie replied, nodding definitively. "And we should probably start now."

Stiles's face scrunched up questioningly and he was probably about to ask her what she meant by that. But he didn't need to. He would find out soon enough.

Charlie leaned forwards and kissed him. It was becoming so much easier to do. For a while she would get this feeling of nervousness, like maybe it wasn't what she should do under that specific set of circumstances. But each time she felt less of that uncertainty. And Stiles sure as hell wasn't hesitating. But it wasn't just his eagerness or enthusiasm that reassured her. He kissed her the way he looked at her. With sincerity.

Almost immediately Stiles's hand reached up, his fingers making their way into her hair, and pulled her face closer towards his. Her heart began to beat faster and she got that now familiar swooping sensation in the pit of her stomach. Needing him closer, Charlie grabbed hold of the collar of his shirt and pulled him upwards. There was more than a little bit of fumbling involved, but through some miracle, the two of them ended up sitting on the bed, their lips never parting once. Then it happened again. She lost all capacity for coherent thought. His warm lips, the thumb brushing against her jaw line, the cold of his hand against the skin of her waist where her shirt had ridden up a little—all she could do was feel. Winding her arms around his neck, she pulled herself closer to him, arching into his form. It was a bit frenzied, really—probably some combination of enthusiasm and lack of experience on both of their parts. The two of them lost their balance a little and fell backwards onto the bed, but their lips never parted.

"Stiles!"

The second that loud, masculine voice called out, the two of them froze. The sheriff was home. And she was pretty sure the same thought went through both of their minds. One word.

Crap.

"Stiles!" the sheriff called out again, even louder than the first time. "Get your ass out of your room. Dinner's on the table. I picked up dinner from Toby's on the way home from the station."

The moment that Stiles's door began to open felt like it happened in slow motion. Charlie and Stiles sat bolt upright and wrenched apart from each other just as the sheriff stepped into the room. The man was looking down as he stepped past the threshold, completely unaware of what he was walking in on as he continued to speak. "If I hear one crack out how unhealthy it is I swear I'll take some of those curly fries and shove them—"

When Sheriff Stilinski looked up, he froze in place. The eyes widened, the jaw dropped a little bit, and the figure stiffened. Great. Fan-freaking-tastic. Charlie could picture the whole thing in her head. The sheriff walks in, sees her and his son sitting on the bed, sitting an awkward distance from each other, her running her fingers through her mussed hair and Stiles with that frustrated, slightly pissed expression on his face. Sheriff Stilinski being, well, a sheriff, was fairly well versed in things like deduction and detective work. It didn't take much of a leap to figure out what had been happening a moment ago.

"Oh."

The word hung in the air for a while as the sheriff's eyes darted back and forth between the two of them. In that moment, Charlie just wished there was a trapdoor underneath her. It didn't matter what was under it—rats, snakes, certain death, a room full of clowns—she just wanted to fall through that trap door and disappear from this room and this aggressively uncomfortable situation.

It was Stiles who finally broke the silence. "Hey, dad," he said with a highly passive aggressive wave. "You're home early."

"No, I'm not," the sheriff said matter-of-factly. "It's Wednesday. I'm home by 7:30 on Wednesdays and it's—" he looked at his watch "—it's 7:52."

Stiles grunted angrily and shook his head. "There wasn't anything else there that you could work on?" he drawled out sarcastically. "No unopened cases or anything that you would have to dwell on for, like, a couple more minutes?"

Then the sheriff gave Stiles this look that clearly stated 'seriously?!'—a look she was fairly sure he had perfected over the years—and sighed heavily. And then he turned to face her, which was something Charlie was not at all comfortable with. The fact that he smiled at her only made it worse. "Hello again, Charlie," he said. "Good to see you."

"H—yeah," Charlie laughed out awkwardly. "Seeing you is...is good also." And then her eyes fell shut. Great. She was doing Yoda speech, and not intentionally this time.

Sheriff Stilinski observed the two of them for a few more seconds, and then she seemed to come to a decision. He made this exasperated face and nodded at the both of them. "Alright," he muttered. "Charlie, I would love for you to stay for dinner, but unfortunately I only bought enough for two and you should probably be headed home soon." He waited for a response, but only received what felt like a very loud version of silence. "Okay," the sheriff continued. "I'm—I'm going to go downstairs and set the table. The two of you...leave the door open. Parenting and all that."

He stood there in silence for a few more moments before nodding. Then he just turned around and disappeared through the door—the one that was supposed to leave open. As soon as the sheriff got out of earshot, Stiles collapsed backwards on the bed, letting out a loud groan. "Seriously," he whined. "Friggin' twice? That's not unfair—that's freaking vindictive." He let out another groan and threw himself back into the sitting position, glowering at the spot his father was standing in a second ago. "Ugh. My dad just caught me making out, didn't he?"

Charlie just let out an uncomfortable laugh and patted him on the back harder than she probably needed to. "You got caught by your dad," she said, looking at him pointedly. "I got caught by the sheriff. Who's having the weirder night here?" At that suggestion, the wince on Stiles's face deepened even further, and Charlie patted him on the back, comfortingly this time. "I think I'm gonna head home. I have to cook dinner for Mel and...well, and be anywhere but here in this exact moment in time, so..."

She leaned forwards, pressing her lips to his just for a long moment before getting to her feet. When she stood, she found his hand still clasped in hers. She squeezed it tight for a moment and then released it, heading for the door. She stopped in the doorframe for a second and smiled back at Stiles. "Your dad gets home later on Thursdays," she murmured, not able to keep the smile from her face. "I'll see you tomorrow."

And then she sashayed away from him with more attitude, swagger, and confidence than she was used to showing. Or felt. Hell, it was kind of like she was channeling her inner Lydia. Stiles said something in response, but honestly she couldn't decipher it. It was more incoherent mumbling than anything else. One more awkward interaction with sheriff Stilinski—he told her to have a nice evening and she laughed and ran straight out the door—and she was on the road, heading home. And for the first time in a long time, she felt good. Last night had been her walking on a cloud. That sort of elation, while incredible to feel, could never be sustained. By this point the spell had faded away a bit and she was left feeling satisfied—content. For now at least, for the first time in a long time, that gaping hole she felt in her chest was filled. And despite the quagmire for discomfort she had just waded through with the sheriff, she found herself smiling. She rolled down the windows and let the wind rip through her hair as she sped down the forest-lined streets.

It had been a good day.

**Chapter 16 Soundtrack (also you can check out my Spotify account, see the link on my profile)**

**Charlie wakes up and freaks out a little bit over her situation. A hallucination is involved.**

**-~-~-~-~-~Strange Like We Are – Campfire OK**

**Charlie goes to school and sees Stiles waiting for her on the steps. She and Stiles hold hands and walk through the halls.**

**-~-~-~-~-~Our Hearts – Firehorse**

**The make out session.**

**-~-~-~-~-~Come Closer – Miles Kane**

**Charlie goes to lunch and sits down. Scott appears out of nowhere and they have a little talk.**

**-~-~-~-~-~Private Cars - The Ross Sea Party**

**Charlie goes home and prepares for meeting Stiles to research.**

**-~-~-~-~-~In Our Circles - Guineafowl**

**Stiles and Charlie study, glancing at each other intermittently. This part doesn't take up much of the text, but just imagine it on the TV screen or whatever. Them glancing at each other while they research and smiling a bit.**

**-~-~-~-~-~Should We All Wake Up – Eric & Magill**

**The make out session, part 2. I'm using the same song as the first one, kind of picking up where the song petered out the first time around. It would have a logical consistency to it. Like they got interrupted the first time so they're continuing with that. A bit cruel of me to have them interrupted twice, but sexually frustrated Stiles is endlessly hilarious.**

**-~-~-~-~-~Come Closer – Miles Kane**

**Charlie drives home. This is a cathartic moment. The music is a mellow, but has a feeling of hope and bright expectations that I love.**

**-~-~-~-~-~Empire Trashed – Drop Electric**

**Okay! So there it is! I haven't really gotten a chance to edit it, so sorry for grammatical errors that make me look like a moron. I promise I'm not an idiot. I just type faster than I think.**

**Also, Charles/Starlie/Chiles or whatever you want to call it. I hope this chapter kind of set the bar for what they're going to be like as a couple. They care about each other, they're going to banter like usual, but it's not going to be all sunshine and rainbows and unicorns and puppies. I hope that you like where they're going.**

**Also, it might be a while before I post again. I don't want to take a break, but, as I may have mentioned, I'm moving to New York. Did I mention I'm moving to New York? Anyways, that takes stuff like planning and finding a space in which I can live (preferably out of the reach of the Mothra-sized cockroaches). But never fear! I will return.**

**Enjoy!**


	17. Regression Towards the Mean

**Disclaimer: I don't own Teen Wolf. If I did, I'd be looking at much fancier apartments.**

**Alright, so this isn't my longest chapter, and it might not be my best one either. I'm still insanely busy what with trying to find a place to live and all, but I wanted to give you something and here it is. I'm sorry for the grammar mistakes, etc. It's really late and I need to go to sleep for work tomorrow morning.**

**Seriously, you guys, thank you so much for everything and for putting up the frazzled mess that is Cate. Okay. Love you all.**

**As promised, the list of thank yous to all of my wonderful readers! Daenerys86, BewareTheBearShark, Marrow365, DraxThePacifist, LegalAddiction20, zvc56, Bai, Guest 1, Guest 2, Hanna, Guest 3, Guest 4, theforceisnotwithyou, TheMMMG, Everlastingabyss, PhoenixRage92, katiesgotagun, shy-lady, Guest 5, Just Anonymous, DarknessHitsMe, bagginsoftheshire666, Micaela M, OhSkinnyLove, Noxen, Female whovian, SimplyKelly, Paige, Tania, Montanasmith5897, Sonny13, anotherpageinmystory, HopeForDuende, XxRikela-chanxX, 21, Gee Brittany, Ayine, Undeniable Weirdness, seasidewriter1, Crash88, myharlequinromance321, 1 Fan, SortofForever, Atomicity, xCHARMEDxDOCTORxWHOx, Bai, Guest 6, Guest 7, Guest 8, ellsosaurus, Leia, Jane, Jane Smith, rebornwhole, Of Limes And Kiwis, Bookiee, and X23 Maximoff...you are all awesome.**

Chapter 17 – Regression Towards the Mean

Sometimes it's amazing the difference twenty-four hours can make in the way you view the world.

When Charlie awake the previous morning, all she could feel was anxiety and unease. This morning she felt something that she hadn't felt for a long time. Refreshed. Relaxed. Downright calm. Objectively it made no sense for her to feel that way. There were still plenty of things to be panicking about, the least of which was not the chemistry lab she was going to be subjected to in fourth period. Their school principal was still a broadsword-wielding psycho, there was still a giant lizard monster on the loose, and from what she could see Derek and his newly established pack were shaping up to be a bunch of impulsive morons. All in all the list of things that could go horribly, horribly wrong was longer than the list of homework assignments Harris had assigned them, but she still managed to have this feeling of peace. And for the first time in a long time when that loud, blaring sound woke her up, she didn't punch her alarm clock.

She had slept. It might not sound like much of an achievement, but to her it was a freaking miracle. She had actually, properly slept. No restless tossing and turning, no waking up in the middle of the night shaking and covered in sweat, no exhausting conversations with snarky and secretive werewolves. In fact there was nothing at all. Just pure, uncompromised, dreamless sleep.

Throwing off her covers, Charlie sat up in her bed and stretched, yawning widely. Then, hopping to her feet she strode over to her window and threw open the drapes, letting the light spill in. This time, instead of throwing her hands up to cover her face and shrinking away like a mole person. Hissing and cries of 'ah, it burns the skin!' might have been involved. But not this time. This time she stood in her window and let the sunlight hit her face, smiling into the rays. She glanced back at her bedside table, her eyes falling on that dark blue glass bottle and eyedropper. "Thanks Deaton," she muttered to herself. "I owe you one."

Charlie went about getting ready for school, pulling on a loose-fit, cropped sweater, some black pants, and a pair of combat boots. Honestly, it felt like someone had hit the reboot button on her brain. For so long she had felt like she was fraying at the edges, but today she almost felt whole again. Her eyes didn't ache or have that bruised purple bags underneath them, her limbs didn't feel heavy, and that crick that had been in her neck for the past week had disappeared. She felt good. And it wasn't just because of the good night's sleep.

Tethered. That's how Charlie felt. It was like she more permanent—like she wasn't about to just drift away. And that was because of Stiles. Sure this was still Beacon Hills and danger still lurked around every corner, but danger wasn't the thing that scared her the most. That honor went to disappointment—getting her hopes up only to have them stomped on. That was what really scared her. All her life her philosophy had been never to have high expectations, because those expectations could only lead to even greater disappointments. But now...those disappointments didn't seem quite so inevitable anymore.

After quickly plaiting her hair into a messy braid, she grabbed her bag and bounded about halfway down the stairs before opting to slide the rest of the way down on the banister before landing on the ground floor with a soft thump. "Charlie?" Mel's slightly confused voice echoed from the kitchen. She rounded the corner and turned into the foyer, fixing earrings in her ears, and her brow furrowed slightly. "You're up early," the woman observed.

"Am I?" Charlie mused, pursing her lips slightly. "It is a school day."

"So it is," Mel observed, nodding along with her words. "And most school days involve you hitting the snooze button about ten times. Then at about 7:23 I hear you shout 'oh, crap' followed by a loud bang which I'm pretty sure is you falling out of bed. But—" she gestured up and down Charlie's body "—here you are willingly awake and fully dressed a total twenty minutes early."

Charlie made a face and shrugged. "Maybe I'm turning over a new leaf."

At that Mel's eyes narrowed at her suspiciously. "Is this one of those body-snatcher situations? Should I be contacting the local authorities?"

Charlie snorted a bit and shook her head. "I'm sure Sheriff Stilinski has more pressing issues to deal with. I can be in a good mood without there being a vast conspiracy behind it." Then, without any warning whatsoever, Mel grabbed hold of Charlie's chin and twisted her face from side to side, scrutinizing her carefully. "Uh, Mel?" Charlie managed to force out, despite the fact that Mel was kind of squishing her face. "Can you explain to me exactly what is happening right now?"

"I'm looking for the traces of the vast conspiracy that is behind this," Mel murmured, still studying Charlie like the girl was a specimen in biology lab.

"A—alright," Charlie forced out, swatting Mel's hand away. "I think that's more than enough of that."

But apparently it wasn't enough, because a look of realization dawned on Mel's face. The eyes widened, the mouth formed an 'o' shape, and then that look of glee. "Oh my God!"

Suddenly Charlie froze. "Oh, shit."

Frankly, she should have known this would happen. Mel might not be the most observant person in the world, but there was one thing that was very hard to hide from her. Romance. When it came to romance, the woman was a freaking bloodhound. You could try and hide it behind a wall of silence and a curtain of feigned apathy, but she would still sniff it out. It was all those romantic comedies she watched—it had to be.

In that moment, the atmosphere in the room changed dramatically. It went from idle morning chitchat to the most upbeat and cheerful interrogation of all time. Mel began to circle around Charlie slowly, a tiny smirk fixed on her face. "So, Charlie," Mel drawled out, her voice adopting a lower tone that sounded almost calculating. "Why are you in such a hurry to get to school?"

"I'm not," Charlie replied, her spine straightening.

"Is that so?" Mel asked skeptically. "Are you sure? Nobody you're eager to see?"

"Who would I want to see at school?" the girl shot back. "School is hell and Harris is the devil. Only a lot less charming than the image generally presented in current popular culture."

"You know, you seemed awfully chipper when I got home last night," Mel continued. She had seized onto a line of questioning and there was no way she was letting it go. "Your cheeks were a little flushed. And I know it's not because you were wearing blush. What exactly were you up to before I saw you?"

"Nothing," Charlie replied evasively. "Hanging out with friends. Studying. The same old racket."

"Really?" Mel chirped, continuing to circle like a shark swimming around its prey. "Which friends exactly?"

"Just friends," Charlie said quickly. "I have lots of friends—I'm a friendly person. I'm a freaking delight."

"Come on, Charlie," Mel sighed. She finally stopped circling around Charlie, halting directly in front of the girl and fixing her with a serious stare. "I thought that you and I were close—that I was somebody you were comfortable confiding in. I mean, I know that you've only been here for six months, but I thought that we were in a good place. You can tell me anything—you know that, right?"

It didn't matter that the whole thing was an act of blatant emotional manipulation. Both Charlie and Mel were fully aware that this was all theater, but as soon as Mel batted those lashes and made those sad puppy eyes, Charlie was a goner. That was the thing about genuinely nice people like Mel—they spend so much time trying to make you happy, if there is even the tiniest thing you can do to make them happy, you just have to do it. There's no choice in the matter.

Charlie let out a heavy sigh and scratched at her forehead. "Fine," she grumbled, glowering in the face of Mel's incandescent smile. "Stiles, uh, Stiles and I...there may or may not be some non-Platonic, reciprocated feelings happening. Relationship-i-ness has been implied."

Mel just stared at Charlie evenly for a moment, completely devoid of any reaction to the news. At first Charlie was beginning to think that there might actually be something wrong with the woman when, all of the sudden, Mel's facial expression changed, almost as if in slow motion. It started out as that pleading look and then slowly shifted to one of almost manic glee. It was actually pretty terrifying. If kind of looked like she was wearing a clown mask or something. "Oooookay," Charlie drawled out, slowly edging to side. "Good talk. Have a good day. See you tonight."

And then Charlie made a dash for it. Or at least tried to. She spun on her heel and was about to take off in the opposite direction when a tiny, perfectly manicured hand shot out and snatched her wrist. Mel yanked Charlie back to her with a deceptive strength before throwing her arms around the girl and pulling her into a hug so tight Charlie could have sworn she heard the sound of ribs cracking. "Mel," Charlie choked out, "breathing is a necessary bodily function."

"If you can talk, you can breathe," Mel shot back. "Let me have this moment."

"'Kay," Charlie mumbled.

They stood there for a while, Mel's arms pinning Charlie's to her sides. Just when Charlie was beginning to wonder is Mel was _ever_ going to let go, the feeling of suffocation subsided and Mel slowly released her. "So," Mel said, taking a few steps back and shooting Charlie a smug smile. "You and Stiles, huh?"

"Yup," Charlie sighed out, popping the 'p'. She folded her arms across her chest and blew out a long breath. "Me and Stiles. Can we try not to make a huge deal about it? Because I really don't think I can handle this becoming some huge 'thing'."

"We can try," Mel smirked. "Whether or not we'll be successful is an entirely different matter."

"Oh my God," Charlie groaned. She rocked back on her heels and stared at the ceiling, silently praying for some sort of divine intervention that could swoop in and save her from what was about to happen. But, nope. Nothing happened. Thanks for nothing, universe. "Okay," Charlie finally said, running her hands down her face. "Let's get this over with. Stiles and I are romantically entangled. There. I said it. Any comments or concerns you'd like to share?"

Charlie didn't think it physically possible, but that smile got just a little bit wider. "Oh, I've got one comment," she said slyly.

"Great," Charlie said, throwing her hands in the air in resignation. "Let's hear it."

Mel smiled enigmatically for a few more moments before finally speaking. "I totally knew it. I knew he'd come to his senses."

Charlie let out a scoff in protest and rolled her eyes heavily. "You did not."

"Um, yes," Mel replied with a superior nod. "Yes, I did. I'm psychic."

"Shut up," Charlie groaned. "You did not know. Not for sure."

Mel let out a high-pitched scoff and planted her hands on her hips, staring Charlie down. "Did so."

"Oh, so that's how we're going to play it," Charlie said, her eyebrows shooting up. She placed her hands on her hips as well, mimicking Mel's pose. "Did not."

"Did so."

"Did not."

"Did so."

"Did not."

That back and forth went on for longer than either Charlie or Mel would have probably cared to admit. Suffice to say that the minute hand on the wall clock shifted several positions during the interchange. It was only when Charlie thought she might be in danger of being late for school that she made any effort to put any end to it. "Alright," she said, holding her hands up, cutting off one of Mel's 'did so's. "Okay. If, in fact, you did 'totally know it'...how?"

Then Mel gave her one of those slightly patronizing, almost pitying looks. "Oh my dear, sweet Charlie," she sighed out, wrapping an arm around her niece's shoulders. "There are so many things I could point out—the number of times he would call you, all those times I caught him just looking at you whenever he was visiting. He might not have known yet, but he was totally into you. But I've got to say what clinched it for me was the camera."

"The camera?" Charlie repeated, scrunching her face up into an expression of confusion.

"Yup," Mel said with a definitive nod. "That Polaroid camera he got you."

"That was a thank you gift," Charlie said with a shrug. "He got it for me because I got him a date with Lydia for the Winter Formal."

Again, Mel shook her head at Charlie and patted the girl on the shoulder. "Charlie, thank you gifts are things like flowers or chocolates or picture frames. That camera? That was a deeply personal and very thoughtful gift. You don't get something like that for just anybody." Mel paused for a moment before lunging forwards, wrapping Charlie in yet another huge hug. "I'm so happy for you. I'm glad the two of you charming idiots finally got it together. I've been rooting for this for a while."

"Yeah, I know," Charlie snorted, hugging her aunt back. "You weren't exactly subtle about it." When she withdrew she fixed Mel with a curious look. "Why is it so important to you that I be dating someone."

Mel let out a sigh and shrugged her shoulders. "It wasn't so much the fact that you were dating anyone," she replied quietly. "It's just...you and your dad moved around so much and you had each other. He was your home. Here you just had me, and you weren't going to get to start over again. I want this—living here—I want it to feel permanent, and I want you to be happy. I want it to feel like home. And maybe, with enough friends and people who care about you, it could be home."

"It is home, Mel," Charlie said with a shrug. "It's been home for a while now."

As soon as the words left Charlie's mouth, tears began to well up behind Mel's eyes. She bit her lip and ducked her head down, trying to wipe away the moisture as subtly as she possibly could. "Damn it," she swore quietly. "You're going to go and make me hug you again."

"Oh!" Charlie chirped, holding onto the strap of her messenger bag and backing away slowly. "Well in that case I should probably make a break for it. I don't want to be late for school."

"Hey!"

"I'll see you tonight, Mel!" Charlie called out over her shoulder as she began to stride towards the front door.

"Wait!" Mel shouted after her. "Did you get breakfast?"

"Love you too!"

"Charlie!" Mel called out one last time, chasing after the girl.

Charlie paused at the front door and turned around to face her aunt. "Yeah, Mel?"

Mel came to a stop in front of Charlie and placed her hand on her niece's shoulder, giving it a comforting squeeze. "If Stiles ever hurts you," she said seriously. "I will kill him."

A light snort forced its way out of Charlie's nose and she covered Mel's hand with her own. "Thanks, Mel. But...I don't think it's going to come to that."

"Huh—well I should hope not," Mel scoffed. "He's the sheriff's son. I'd be taking some pretty big risks. Though there do seem to be quite a few unsolved murders in the area." Then Mel stared off into space with an oddly contemplative expression on her face—a look that made Charlie frown to herself. Just as Charlie was about to ask what was wrong, Mel blinked and shook her head like she was reordering her thoughts. "Why are you just standing around like this?" she suddenly accused. "You're going to be late for school. Scoot!"

"Did you just tell me to 'scoot'?" Charlie demanded using air quotes. "Have you been watching 'Brady Bunch' reruns?"

"Charlie," Mel said with a sickly sweetness in her voice. "Get the hell out of my house."

"Now that's more like it," Charlie said, nodding in approval. "That gives you a much greater air of authority."

"Go!"

Smiling widely, Charlie slipped out the front door—with the help of a small shove from Mel—and bounded down the steps leading to the front door before hopping into her car. Honestly, she felt a bit relieved to have Mel know about the whole thing. And telling her was a lot less difficult and face-palm inducing than Charlie had anticipated. She had pictured the whole thing involving no small degree of squealing and a lot of jumping up and down, possibly some cartwheels. But maybe that was the thing about having everybody else realize you liked someone before you realized you did. When you finally get together, the impact isn't quite that huge. Thank God.

Boyfriend. Charlie Oswin had a boyfriend. Or at least she was pretty sure she did. She and Stiles had never actually gone so far as to use the words 'boyfriend' and 'girlfriend', and it would probably be a while before she could say it out loud, but for all intents and purposes that's what they were. At least she thought that's what they were. Hell, with all the time they spent together they were probably on the equivalent of their fiftieth date. The only new aspect was the making out part. Not that she didn't like that part. She definitely liked that part. A lot.

Boyfriend. Honestly, Charlie had never really understood why people used the term. Just shove together the words 'boy' and 'friend' and suddenly the term took on this whole new meaning. Plus all of the terms sounded so juvenile. Boyfriend. Girlfriend. Dating. She wasn't sure why, but Charlie hated all of them. It felt like they undervalued the actual relationship. Which was at least part of why she avoided using them. But they were useful for one thing. Clarity. And finally having something close to approaching that sort of clarity was a relief.

When she got to school, Charlie took a deep breath and shoved her earphones in her ears before winding through the hallways in the direction of her locker. She keyed in the combination to her lock and let the door swing open. What she saw lying at the bottom made her eyes fall shut. "Shit."

Her economics note cards. They were lying at the bottom of her locker, mocking her. That's right. Their freaking mid-term was in tomorrow. Between all of the supernatural crap going on, trying to be there for Lydia, and all of the stuff with Stiles, she had completely spaced. How was she supposed to be a warrior against all things evil and maintain her A average all at the same time? Shit. Maybe she would should have a 'Buffy the Vampire Slayer' marathon and check for any possible pointers on how to apply time management to the supernatural. But then again marathoning television programs was counterintuitive when you're trying to find more study time.

Or maybe she should get a planner.

3:30pm-5:30pm: study for economics

5:30pm-7:00pm: battle giant lizard monster

7:00pm-7:30pm: cook dinner

But then again being attacked wasn't exactly something you could set a time slot for. It was a good thing she had a semi-photographic memory or she would be totally screwed. It's not like you can put 'battling a kanima' on the list of extracurriculars you submit to colleges. Maybe she could say she was on the track team. They did end up doing a lot of running.

Swearing under her breath, Charlie quickly exchanged her books, placing the ones for her morning classes in her bag. Then she snatched up the note cards and shoved them in the pocket of her jacket. She could sneak in some study time during English class today. Actually that's what she usually used English class for these days. Pretty soon she was going to start referring to it as 'study hall'.

Charlie went to close the door to her locker, but before she did something made her pause. The inside of her locker door was covered in pictures, all taken with that Polaroid camera Stiles had given her. There was one photo, though, that jumped out at her. It was her and Stiles right before the Winter Formal. His dad had taken a bunch of pictures of them then, pretty much all of them with the pair doing ridiculous poses or making weird facial expressions. But the picture she was looking at wasn't one of those. It was something from between those poses.

Plucking that picture off the locker door, Charlie studied it for a few moments. She had taken off her shoes and was waving them around and her mouth was wide open, no doubt in the middle of one of her rants about the injustice of high heels. Stiles was a few feet to her left, smiling at her antics. But there was more to his expression than that. There was something in his eyes that she couldn't quite describe. Maybe that was the look Mel was talking about.

Biting back a smile, Charlie took that photo and tucked it into one of her books before once again shutting the door to her locker. But that smile disappeared when the door swung closed and she found herself face to face with none other than Isaac Lahey.

"Jesus!" Charlie shouted, jumping about three feet in the air in surprise. Isaac gave a tiny half-smile in response. He was leaning his shoulder against the line of lockers, hands in his pockets, as casual as he could possibly be, and looking pretty damn pleased with himself.

"Isaac—what the hell!" Charlie hissed, punching him in the shoulder. She ripped the earphones out of her ears and shoved them in the pocket of her jacket before rounding on him. "Do you actively enjoy scaring the crap out of me?"

"Maybe," he said with a casual shrug. "You look cute when you're freaked out."

"Shut up," Charlie said with a roll of her eyes. She slammed the locker shut and flipped her braid over her shoulder before turning to face him, fixing Isaac with a serious stare. "What are you doing here, Isaac?"

Isaac made a face and rolled against the surface of the locker so that his back was leaning against the metal surface. "Well I don't know if you've noticed, Charlie," he said, nodding in her direction, 'but this place we're standing? It's called school. Teenagers like you and me are typically expected to spend our time here, you know, absorbing knowledge. Apparently it's important."

"Thank you," she bit out sarcastically. "That really helped clarify things for me."

Isaac smirked and shrugged at her again. "Meh. I do what I can."

Charlie glowered at him, her frustration rising. "Don't be obtuse, Isaac."

"I wouldn't if I knew what that meant," he replied, his eyes widening with an innocence she didn't quite believe. Charlie sighed loudly and pinched at the bridge of her nose in frustration.

"Isaac, seriously, what are you doing here?"

"Ooooooooh," Isaac drawled out, like he had just realized what she was talking about. "You're referring to my recent issues with law enforcement."

"The fact that you've been in hiding for the past few weeks?" Charlie snapped back, raising her eyebrows at him. "Yeah. That'd be what I'm talking about."

A sly smile crept across Isaac's face. That smile gave Charlie a distinct feeling of unease. She had picked up on a shift in Isaac's demeanor the last time they had spoken, but here it was displayed in full form. It was like that timid, quietly sarcastic boy she had officially met during winter formal had been erased entirely. That tiny, shy smile had been replaced by a smug, superior smirk. And honestly? She kind of hated it. It felt like he was taunting her. Charlie wasn't sure what Derek was doing to his pack, but between this transition and Erica's, they all seemed to be turning into a bunch of overly confident jackasses.

Almost as if to prove her point, Isaac sighed knowingly and jerked his head to the side noncommittally, making it absolutely clear that he knew something she didn't. "You might want to ask Jackson about that," he replied evasively. "He cleared up a bit of a problem for me."

Charlie let out a scoff of disbelief. "You're saying that Jackson helped you? Jackson doesn't do anything unless it directly benefits him."

"True," Isaac said, bobbing his head a bit, "but then again, I can be very persuasive."

Charlie opened her mouth to ask him exactly what he meant by that, but before she got the chance a cloud of lustrous, blonde curls descended on them. Erica came to a stop in front of the pair, sneering at Charlie a bit before turning to face Isaac. "I've been looking for you," she said bluntly.

"And you found me," Isaac replied casually. "What do you want?"

"In case you don't remember, we have things to do," Erica replied. She enunciated the words carefully like she was talking to a toddler, but Charlie got the feeling the tone was directed more towards her than it was towards Isaac.

"Hey, Erica," Charlie said, turning to face the blonde. "You look great today."

"Go to hell," Erica replied easily, staring at Charlie through wide, deceptively innocent looking eyes.

"Okay, then."

After closing her eyes for a moment and making a 'why me?' face that was oddly reminiscent of the one Derek used to send Charlie's direction, Erica faced Isaac again. "Stop talking to this—" she jerked her thumb at Charlie "—and let's get this done. No wasting time."

Without so much as another word, Erica brushed past Charlie, knocking hard into her shoulder as she did so. The force of it catapulted Charlie backwards, making her back slam into to the lockers. She fought back a hiss of pain, refusing to give Erica the satisfaction, and rubbed at her shoulder as she watched the girl sashay down the hallway. "Wow," she said, staring at Erica's retreating form. "She really, really hates me."

"Apparently," Isaac drawled out, nodding in agreement. Then, suddenly, he pushed himself off the lockers and drew himself to his full height. He shoved his hands in his pockets and walked backwards a few steps. "See you in English class." Then he winked at her—actually winked at her—before spinning around and jogging a few steps to catch up with Erica. The last image had of the pair was Isaac draping his arm over Erica's shoulders as the two of them rounded the corner around the hallway. Well, that and the dirty look Erica shot her.

Shit. Shit, shit, shit.

This had to mean something. Isaac showing up again, Erica's cryptic and bitchy declarations, it all could only add up to one thing. Derek was making a play. The only this time she didn't have the slightest clue what he was up to. Which was probably a bad thing, because these days Derek's plans tended to be of the sucky variety. And of the deadly variety.

Charlie honestly wasn't sure how long she stood outside her locker, gaping after them and wondering what the hell was going on. It must have been a while, though, because all of the sudden the school bell rang, wrenching her out of her reverie. "Crap," she swore loudly, earning her more than a few odd looks from passersby. Immediately she began grappling around in her bag unit she got her hands on her cell phone. She quickly flipped through her contacts until she found the one now labeled 'Pookie Bear' and hit send.

"Come on, Stiles," she whispered to herself, anxiously bouncing up and down on the balls of her feet. "Pick up, pick up, pick up!"

Two words into the voice message, Charlie hung up the phone and shoved it back into her bag. Swearing one more time, she took off down the hallway and sprinted in the direction of her English class, dodging between and practically running into other students as she moved. Finally she made it to English class. Her eyes darted around the room looking for Stiles, but he hadn't made it in yet so she threw herself into the empty desk next to Scott, causing the feet to grate loudly against the laminate floor.

"Whoa, Charlie!" Scott exclaimed, blinking in surprise at her sudden and rather violent appearence. "What was that about?"

"I—Isaa—" she panted out, sucking in deep breaths.

"Are you okay?" Scott asked, eyeing her warily. "You look kinda sweaty."

"Not important," she said, waving her hand dismissively and swallowing. "We—we've got a problem. A crisis of tsunami-like proportions!"

"Did they stop serving tater tots in the cafeteria?" Scott inquired further, giving her a bemused look.

"Wha—no," Charlie replied, shaking her head. "No. Why would they ever do that—that would be idiotic. Why would you even think that?"

Scott gave her a confused frown and shrugged. "Because of that time you held up a tater tot and said 'if they ever stop selling these it would be a crisis of tsunami-like proportions'."

"Well it's worse that that," Charlie hissed. Then she paused for a moment, cocking her head to the side in consideration. "Yeah," she finally elaborated, nodding a bit. "Definitely way, way worse than that."

"Well then what is it, then?" Scott whispered frantically.

Charlie opened her mouth to respond, but before she got the chance her eyes snapped to the door. Isaac was waltzing into the room, completely carefree. Letting out a bitter scoff, Charlie smacked Scott in the arm and nodded in Isaac's direction. "That's what I'm talking about," she muttered, sinking into her seat defeatedly.

At that point she saw a variety of emoji-like expressions crossing Scott's face. It started out as 'confused face'. After that it transitioned to 'face with mouth open', quickly followed by 'cat making Home Alone face'. Finally it landed squarely on 'face with open mouth and cold sweat', a sentiment which she definitely shared. Yup. The situation seemed to be very 'pile of poo' and it made Charlie want to 'puff of air with a trail leading after it'. Run away. It made her want to run away.

Isaac nodded at them, clearly enjoying the mutual look of horror prominently displayed on both Charlie's and Scott's faces. He slammed a couple of papers, probably from the administration office, on the teacher's desk before sliding into one of the chairs in the front row. Even just staring at the back of his head she could tell that stupid smile was still there.

"O—oh my God," Scott stammered out, his head snapping back and forth as he looked between her and Isaac.

"H—yeah," Charlie said, nodding a bit. "I know."

"Oh my God!"

"I know!"

Scott began shaking his head in a way that seemed almost pathological. "Wh—when—I mean why—What is he doing here?"

"I don't know," she said, exhaling sharply, "but whatever the hell he's here for it can't be good. Derek's definitely up to something." Charlie sank even lower in her seat and slapped a hand over her forehead. Isaac could hear everything they were saying—goddamn werewolf hearing.

As the room filled with students, it began to fill with more noise as well. Apparently the sudden reappearance of a guy who, as far as anybody was concerned, was suspect number one in his father's murder, caused a wee bit of a stir among the student body. There was, however, one student who remained completely silent, mostly due to his very conspicuous absence. Stiles. Where the hell was he?

Eventually the noise got to the point where Mr. Hobson had to step in. And, as with pretty much everything he did, it came with a side of annoyed reluctance. "Alright," he called out at the top of his lungs. "I realize that you all probably find Mr. Lahey's decision to rejoin us very interesting. In fact, you probably find it more interesting than out lesson today on grammar. But I've seen enough of the texts and tweets you geniuses send to know that if you want to come even close to getting into college, this is a lesson you all desperately need. And if that's not enough of a motivator for you all, I am happy to inform you that today's lesson will end with a quiz. This quiz will be graded harshly. Any questions?" He paused for a moment looking for any raised hands, but instead was met with a wall of blank stares. "No questions," Mr. Hobson sighed. "It's gotten to the point where I've stopped being surprised. Congratulations. You guys win."

With one last, heaving sigh, Mr. Hobson turned back to the board and began to scribble. "Alright, not I'm going to start with clauses. Stop me if it's too much for you."

If Mr. Hobson thought that anybody was paying the least bit of attention to him, he was going to be sorely mistaken. Though given his generally blasé attitude when it came to, well, everything, Charlie thought he was probably safe. She and Scott exchanged serious looks, both of them clearly brainstorming as to what exactly had happened. Mr. Hobson had just begun speaking, when all of the sudden the sound of sneakers squeaking against laminate echoed through the hallway. It was a few more moments before the source of the noise appeared. Stiles careened through the door, practically running into a couple of desks before collapsing in a seat next to Charlie and Scott.

"I just talked to my dad who just talked to Jackson and I've got really terrible, horrible, very, very bad news," he said, looking back and forth between her and Scott urgently.

"Yeah, I think we already know," Scott hissed, gesturing at Isaac.

Stiles stopped and stared at the curly blonde back of Isaac's head. He turned back to Charlie, his eyes wide with concern. "Oh shi—"

But he was interrupted by a sigh, one exceptionally heavy enough that it drew all of their attention to the front of the room. Mr. Hobson's shoulders sagged visibly, but he didn't bother turning around. "Mr. Stilinski," he announced to the room, "if you insist on being late for my class, at least be subtle enough that I can pretend not to notice you sneaking in. Thank you."

Their discourse was pretty much put to an end right then and their. Apparently there was a threshold that could be crossed, pushing Mr. Hobson from passive aggression to outright aggression. When their whispers were met with threats of detention, they pretty much had to keep their mouths shut. With Derek making a move, they couldn't afford detention. Detention would destroy any chances at a counter move.

Over the course of the class, the three of them were getting visibly antsier. Scott's jaw began to twitch and Stiles began drumming his fingers and tapping his pen at a frequency that was pretty freaking annoying. Charlie on the other hand just sort of powered down. To the outside viewer she probably seemed pretty calm, but that calmness was pretty freaking deceptive. All of her jumpiness was isolated to the interior of her own skull, testing out theories and speculating wildly. She had one or two ideas of what might be going on, but she couldn't dwell on them for more than a few seconds without her head feeling like it was about to explode.

Regression towards the mean. It was one of the concepts they had discussed in math class. It sounded super-technical and everything, but the term described a very simple concept. And that concept was that you couldn't escape average. You can have data points that are very high or very low, but chances are the next one will take you a lot closer to average. It was pretty pathetic that Charlie was using mathematical theorems as a metaphor for her life, but it fit pretty damn well.

The key to the whole thing hinged on the definition of average. For Charlie, last year 'average' would have meant chilling on the couch and watching _Friends _reruns. This year her 'average' was desperately trying to avert a constant barrage of supernatural catastrophes. There could be aberrant data points—she could have a spectacularly good day or a spectacularly bad day—but no matter what happened, how happy she was yesterday, there was still going to be this screwed up world waiting for her in the present. Walking in the clouds was over—she was getting dragged back down to earth. It was time to be confused, scared, and panicked again. You know. Average.

The sound of the end-of-period bell echoed in her ears so loudly she almost wanted to clap her hands over them to block out the sound. She took a deep breath, grabbed the grammar quiz she probably failed, and shoved it in Mr. Hobson's hands before running after Stiles and Scott who were already on their way out the door.

"Alright," Stiles said, nodding at her as she caught up with the pair. "We only found one thing online called the 'kanima'. It's a were-jaguar from South America that goes after murderers."

Scott exhaled sharply and shook his head. "That thing was not a jaguar."

"Yeah," Charlie said, rolling her eyes a bit. "I think the scales cleared that issue up nicely. Same thing goes for the eyes and the tail and the whole 'paralytic goo' thing and the—"

"Yeah, and the fact that I'm not exactly a 'murderer' should play in a bit too!" Stiles interjected with air quotes.

"Yeah, but you did see it kill somebody," Scott pointed out, thinking aloud. "Which is probably why it tried to kill you. And it's still trying to kill you. And it probably won't stop until your dead!"

As Scott droned on, Stiles and Charlie slowly came to a stop, staring after him in disbelief as he continued to walk, completely oblivious to their absence. "You know I'm really beginning to question this 'friendship'!" Stiles growled after him, again using air quotes.

Charlie sighed loudly and clapped a heavy hand on his shoulder. "Dude, I'm sorry," she mumbled quietly. "That's a bummer. A this thing—" she pointed back and forth between the two of them "—this thing with us only just started." She winced theatrically and shook her head in disappointment.

Stiles's head sort of rolled on his neck so that he ended up staring at her with a look that was in no way appreciative. "Thanks fut it or the support," he drawled out sarcastically, glowering at her. "Really, I'm drowning in it."

"_Drowning _in it?" Charlie repeated with equal sarcasm, raising her eyebrows pointedly to remind him of their recent shared near death experience. "Don't you think it's a little early for making those kinds of comments?"

Stiles rolled his eyes so heavily she could practically hear it. "Have I ever told you how much I hate you?" he grumbled.

"About six times per week," Charlie chirped in response. But there was some sincere anxiety in his eyes that made her pause. Frowning to herself, she reached down and linked their fingers together. His hand squeezed back instinctively. Charlie elbowed him in the arm, making him look at her. "Hey," she murmured, giving him a reassuring look. "That thing was not a were-jaguar. And even if it was, I'm pretty sure Derek qualifies as a murderer. I mean he has killed people. Maybe it was after him."

"Please," Stiles scoffed. "Our luck's not _that _good."

"Stiles!"

"Oh, come on!" he drawled out. "You have to admit, that would solve all kinds of problems. Like a lot of problems."

"It probably would, but that's kinda not the point." Charlie let out a disbelieving snort and shook her head. "Just go to Econ, Stiles. We'll work all this out later. We always do."

Stiles let out a huff, but nodded in agreement. "Fine. Be reasonable. Whatever."

"See you at lunch?"

"Yup."

But Stiles didn't head off to economics. At least not at once. Instead he stopped, peering left and right like he was making sure the coast was clear. Charlie scrunched up her face into an expression of confusion. "Stiles, what the hell are you—"

She was abruptly cut off as Stiles swooped in, planting a quick kiss on her lips. Before Charlie even had the chance to react or even to kiss him back, he was already jogging down the hallway in the direction of Scott's disappearing form. Charlie stared after him for a while, in a state of pseudo-shock. It wasn't till Stiles shot her one of those tiny, mischievous smiles over his shoulder before she snapped out of it. She shook her head slightly, forcing her thoughts back in order, and bit back a smile. Unfortunately, that smile didn't last very long. It didn't last very long because her eyes fell on pretty much the last person she wanted to talk to. But now he had to go and make himself relevant again.

Jackson was standing just a little ways down the hallway, chatting with Danny. In that moment she remembered those two little words Isaac had said earlier that day. 'Ask Jackson'. Well she had every intention of asking Jackson. What she had no intention of doing, however, of being polite about it.

After five long strides, Charlie found herself standing directly in front of Jackson. Both he and Danny turned to look at her. Danny just gave your average nod of greeting. Jackson, in true form, sent a sneer in her direction. "Is there a reason you're in my face, Chuck?" Jackson demanded, his lip curling in contempt.

Charlie let out a bitter snort and glowered at him with an equal degree of intensity. "You know damn well there's a reason."

Jackson let out that annoyingly overconfident chuckle that made her want to punch him in the face even more than usual. He just let out a sigh and shrugged his shoulders. "Sorry, Chuck," he mused. "I just don't have time for your crazy today. So if you'll excuse me, I have very important economics class to ignore."

He pushed himself off of the lockers he was leaning against and made a move to shove past Charlie, but before he got the chance she planted her hand firmly on his chest and pushed back hard. The crashing noise of his back hitting the cold metal echoed through the hallway, making a few people stop and look in their direction. "What the hell?!" Jackson shouted, his eyes spitting fire.

Danny, on the other hand, just let his eyes fall shut in frustration and shoved the last of his books into his locker before closing it. "Okay," he drawled out, turning to face the both of them. "Clearly you guys have something you need to work out."

"No we don't," Jackson growled, shooting a glance in Danny's direction before continuing to glare at Charlie. "Get your hand off of me. Right now."

But Charlie didn't move. Her jaw twitched in anger as that usual rage she felt towards Jackson built up. "Danny," she said sweetly, never taking her eyes off of the walking tub of hair gel standing in front of her. "Would you please excuse us for a moment? I'm about to be unladylike."

"What?" Danny snorted. "More so than usual?"

"Significantly more so than usual," she grumbled.

"Wow," Danny said, exhaling sharply. "That is more than slightly terrifying. I'm gonna go."

"Good call."

Danny looked between her and Jackson one last time, muttered something that sounded suspiciously like 'everybody in this town is freaking nuts' and continued down the hall, leaving Charlie and Jackson on their own. They kept up their staring contest for a few more moments before Jackson reached up and shoved her hand away. "Fine," he spat, his face sullen. "Can you tell me what you want so we can go back to ignoring each other as quickly as humanly possible?"

"Fine by me," Charlie snapped back. She held her hands in the air and took a step back before folding her arms across her chest. "Isaac. How did he get back in school? And before you start on that whole 'what makes you think I know?' bit, I want you to remind you about the last two times we talked like this. Face. Junk. This time I might go for both."

At first Jackson looked like he was going to say something snide, but he seemed to think better of it. "Look," he hissed, leaning in close. "I got freaking kidnapped last night, okay? One minute I'm working out, the next I'm in some freaking warehouse with Derek and his freaking army of rejects. They force-feed me some goo, and then, boom! I can't move."

Charlie blinked in confusion and narrowed her eyes at him. "Why would Derek go after you?" she asked, her suspicion mounting.

But Jackson didn't answer her question. Suddenly something in his behavior changed. He became twitchy—his eyes roving around like he was looking for something, but even he didn't know what.

"Jackson!"

"How the hell should I know?" he practically exploded, snapping out of that weird state for a moment. "It's not like there's some freaking newsletter they send out! You, McCall, and Stilinski aren't exactly the biggest sharers either." Then, something in his face changed. It started out with his normal edge of hostility, but it slowly morphed until rage was etched into every line. "So you know what, Chuck?" he continued. "Screw you. And screw McCall. Screw all you morons. I mean, I don't even know how you idiots are still—"

He was abruptly cut off by the ring of the second period bell. It was a sound normally accompanied by a general groan of the students as they had to hurry off to their next class, but Jackson's reaction was slightly more extreme. He clapped his hands over his ears and squeezed his eyes shut, almost as if the bell was so loud it caused some sort of extreme mental anguish. Charlie furrowed her eyebrows and studied him carefully until he slowly removed his hands from his ears. "What was that?" Charlie asked quietly.

Jackson's eyes darted back and forth for a few moments, almost like he was reading the page of a book. When he finally raised his eyes to meet hers, he was wearing an expression of accusation. That wasn't a good look. He was looking at her like he knew something she didn't. Jackson _thinking_ he knew something she didn't usually led to problems. Him actually knowing something she didn't...that could be pretty freaking catastrophic.

"Tell me something, Chuck," he spat. He took several steps forward and circled around her until somehow she ended up as the one pressed against the lockers. He cocked his head to the side as he stared at her coldly.

"What the hell is a kanima?"

**Okay, there it is. Please review. They make me super-happy.**

**Thank you guys so much for the support. Seriously, thank you. It means the world to me.**

**Chapter 17 Soundtrack**

**Charlie wakes up in a good mood.**

**-~-~-~-~-Ghost Driver (Acoustic) - South of France**

**Charlie walks around in school and goes to her locker. More generally cheerful music. **

**-~-~-~-~-Cinnamon - Way Yes (I'm not sure why I like this song. Honestly the guys voice sounds a bit like Kermit the frog, but for some reason it just makes me happy. And inexplicable happiness is how Charlie feels in this chapter. At least in the beginning.)**

**Isaac and Erica walk away from Charlie after saying something cryptic things. Isaac winks at Charlie. NOTE: I'm going for a sort of ironically upbeat-sounding soon. I feel it can kind of heighten the 'oh, shit' feeling.**

**-~-~-~-~-Laisse tomber les filles - Fabienne DelSol**

**Jackson backs Charlie against the lockers and demands to know what the kanima is. NOTE: I like this song because there's an element of aggression in it without being overbearing.**

**-~-~-~-~-Bendable Poseable - Hot Chip**

**References!**

**The 'cat making Home Alone face' emoji was I think named by the wonderful Gina Linetti of Brooklyn 99. I now can't think of it as anything else.**


	18. The Best Laid Plans

**Disclaimer: 'Teen Wolf' isn't mine. Shocking, right? But it's true. If there are any similarities in content or dialogue, it has probably originated with the show.**

**A huge thank you resinswhy, Lin148, fighter61998, Crash88, katiesgotagun, WinchesterDixonBros, Gee Brittany, theforceisnotwithyouu, Daenerys86, Everlastingabyss, TheMMMG, DraxThePacifist, YelloSubmarine93, SinfullySilent, stilinskibuns, HopeForDuende, Sonny13, Guest, shy-lady, Guest, Kas, Sam, Noxen, OBSESSEDwithPOWERS, EtroLight13, veenarachel149, Female whovian, OhSkinnyLove, zvc56, Lady Shagging Godiva, Undeniable Weirdness, anon, Caliweiser, Ayine, minstorai, Guest, Bai, read43, TWsos12345, Guest, Anon, and Alaee301 for reviewing.**

**Sorry for grammatical errors!**

Chapter 18 – The Best Laid Plans

Charlie skipped her next class. And the one after that. It was absurdly easy, actually. Mr. Adams—her history teacher—was hung over again, so they got to watch a movie instead. About five minutes into class she raised her hand and asked to go to the bathroom, and then she just never came back. She doubted that Mr. Adams would notice her absence. Usually when he was wearing sunglasses inside, it meant he was fast asleep under them.

When Charlie slid out of that classroom, she didn't go to the bathroom. She didn't even pretend to go to the bathroom. She walked in the exact opposite direction, headed in the direction of the library. Once there, she went to 'her spot'—the one in the furthest, darkest corner where nobody ever went. Though to be fair people rarely ever went to the library these days. It was a good place to go when you wanted to hide. She didn't bother showing up at all for her next class.

As Charlie sat in that cold dank corner under the squeaky air vent and flickering fluorescent light, she could feel anxiety building up inside of her. She had her notebook open on the surface of the table in front of her, her pen poised to write. But the page was still completely and utterly blank. She knew that she needed to come up with something—some sort of plan—but as much as she tried, her mind stayed as blank as that page.

Kanima. That one little word coming from Jackson's lips had changed everything. But the next few words he spoke changed it even more. Lydia. Chemistry. Kanima. And where had he gotten those words? From Erica and Isaac.

It was like a game of mad libs—fill in the blank with the appropriate word until your story reveals itself. No. Actually it was more like clue. Lydia in the chemistry classroom with the kanima. Or at least that's how Derek saw it. It really didn't take a genius to put it all together and honestly Charlie was tearing herself up inside for not putting it together earlier. She had been so insulated in that happy little bubble with Stiles she didn't think—she didn't anticipate—and suddenly everything was unraveling all over again.

How could she have let it come to this? How could she have been so oblivious—so neglectful? She could blame it on her own problems and distractions—on Peter and the kanima—but that was a cop out. It had been clear for a while now that Lydia was not okay. It was also clear that there was going to open up about it. The one time she had come even close to doing so, Charlie had had to run off and get pinned down in a pool by a mini-Godzilla. Charlie had made excuses and lied and run away, and now Lydia was suffering for it.

Derek thought Lydia was the kanima. That was the explanation she could think of. And what was even worse, Charlie could understand why he might think that. Peter had bitten Lydia. Lydia had disappeared into the woods for a solid two days with no recollection of what happened, and as much as Charlie racked her brain she couldn't come up with an alibi for Lydia during any of the kanima attacks. But it couldn't be her. Charlie knew in her heart that it couldn't be her. But Derek didn't have her faith. And she believed what he said outside that swimming pool. If Derek thought that Lydia was the kanima, he was going to kill her.

She had to come clean. She had to tell Lydia about everything—about Peter, about the kanima, about everything. But before she did that, she had to save her life. And as much as she tried to think, that note book stayed blank. She pressed the tip of her pen against the paper, hoping that somehow she would just start writing on instinct and something useful would appear.

"Come on, Oswin," she whispered to herself. "Come on, come on, come on."

She tapped her pen against the paper over and over again as a feeling pressure built up inside of her. And first it was just her nerves, humming with anxiety, but then that anxiety built up inside of her until it felt like it was pressing against her skin—like it was about to explode outwards. Charlie squeezed her eyes shut and just tried to think. She pressed her lips together in a tight 'o' and blew out a long breath.

All of the sudden, she felt a strong, cool breeze hit her in the face and she frowned to herself. The air was too fresh—too crisp—to be that dank draft that blew out of the rattling ventilation system and the smell of musty books had disappeared completely. It was when that breeze caused the pages of her notebook to flutter violently that she finally opened her eyes again. But once she did, she wasn't looking at shelves filled with worn books. She wasn't in the library anymore.

As she jumped up and stumbled from her seat, her chair didn't clatter loudly to the ground behind her. Instead it fell to the ground with a soft thump, its fall cushioned by a thick pad of grass. She was standing alone at the center of the lacrosse field, in the black of night, with those brilliant lights shining in her eyes, putting her on display. It was then that she realized what she was wearing. It wasn't that sweater and pair of skinny jeans she had put on this morning. It was a pale, pink, satiny dress. Charlie studied the fabric for a few moments before yet another light flipped on, washing out everything else so that she was almost blind. Charlie threw her hand up to shield her eyes, feeling her heart beat faster and faster in her chest as the panic began to rise.

"This isn't real," she whispered to herself, shaking her head frantically. "This isn't real. This isn't real."

But, real or not, she couldn't force back the fear. Especially when that figure appeared in the distance, cutting an enormous shadow across the field. As the figure approached, the shadow grew smaller, but the looming sense of dread Charlie felt chilled her to her core. All of the sudden a chill wrapped around her, the cold ate its way into her bones. Her breath crystallized in a cloud in front of her face. That is until she stopped breathing altogether. As the figure approached, Charlie felt herself freeze in place. She knew she should run—that she should get as far away as she could—but she was rooted in place, helpless. Soon enough the vague shape of a man became clearer, the dark trench coat flapping dramatically around his form. Peter.

She knew which night this was. She knew which night she was reliving.

Finally Charlie managed to make her feet move, tripping backwards as Peter advanced on her. He opened his mouth, revealing jagged, threatening fangs. Charlie stumbled over her own feet, collapsing to the ground. She kicked her feet out in front of her, desperately trying to push herself back and out of Peter's path. He reached down and grabbed her arms, holding her hands as she flailed uselessly.

"Get the hell off of me," Charlie hissed in a panic, fighting to get free. "Get off!"

But he didn't release her. He loomed over her, teeth exposed and growling. It was a deep, guttural noise that shook her to her core. She could feel his breath on her face. It smelled like meat, blood, and death.

"CHARLIE!"

The sound of her name brought her back to herself. It wasn't Peter's voice that she heard. It was another voice entirely. She stopped struggling for a moment squeezed her eyes shut one last time, forcing her mind back in place. When she her eyes flew open again, she found herself staring into someone else's, and they were wide, earnest, and light brown. Charlie blinked rapidly, making sure that the image she saw was real. "Stiles?"

Stiles stood before her, crouched low to the ground and grasping her wrists. The look on his face was one she recognized, but one she had never wanted to cause. Fear, anxiety, concern—they were all etched into his face, the lines so pronounced it was as if somebody had carved them into marble. He just stared at her for a while, his eyes darting back and forth as they took in her face, almost like he was reading a book. Then, slowly, he released her wrists. "You're okay," he said, but his voice was tentative like her wasn't quite sure. Like he was still trying to figure it out for himself.

Charlie lunged forward, throwing her arms around his neck and pulling him into an impossibly tight hug. It felt a little bit like she was hanging onto him for dear life. Like he was keeping her back in reality instead of that nightmare hellscape. She buried her head in his shoulder and inhaled deeply, and all the sudden she didn't smell blood anymore. She smelled curly fries and Old Spice. Stiles wrapped his arms around her middle, pulling her in close and resting his head on top of hers. "You're okay," he whispered again, this time with more certainty. "You're okay now."

They stayed that way for a while, holding onto each other. It felt like Stiles was drawing the panic out of her. As his arms tightened around her, she could feel her heartbeat and her breathing begin to slow until they came in line with her. Stiles only began to release her when she began to let go herself. Finally, she pulled back, curling herself into a tight little ball. Or at least she tried to. Before she could fully retreat, Stiles's hands moved so they grasped either side of her face, forcing her to look at him. "Hey," he whispered quietly, pushing the hair out of her face so he could get a better look at her. "Are you okay?"

This time it wasn't a reassurance. It was a question. And then it occurred to Charlie how this must look to him. He didn't see the lacrosse field and Peter's fangs. All he had seen was her—hyperventilating with small, panicked tears leaking out of the corners of her eyes and streaking her face with mascara—having what probably looked like a mental breakdown. Charlie swallowed heavily and nodded. She reached up and tucked her hair behind her ears before covering Stiles's hands with hers, grasping them tightly as she drew them away from her face. "Yeah," she replied hoarsely. "Yeah, I'm okay. It passed now. I'll be fine."

Judging by the expression on Stiles's face, he didn't quite believe her. "That was one of the episodes, wasn't it?" he asked. "One of the hallucinations you were talking about?"

"Yup," Charlie laughed out. "Even dead, Peter continues to be a dick."

At that Stiles laughed too, but it didn't sound like one of his genuine. It sounded tight and forced, and the weak smile didn't even come close to reaching his eyes. Instead, they were filled with worry. Charlie clenched her jaw anxiously, averting her gaze so she didn't have to look at his anxiety. She reached up and placed her hand and grasped his shoulder, squeezing it in a way that was supposed to be comforting. But as soon as she did, Stiles circled a hand around her neck, pulling her forwards as he leaned towards her. He pressed a kiss against her forehead before hugging her again. Again, her arms found her way around him.

"It's Lydia," Charlie croaked, her voice shaking a bit. "I talked to Jackson. He said—"

"Hey," Stiles whispered back, shaking his head against shoulder. "You don't have to think about that right now. Scott and I will fix it. We won't let anything happen to her. We'll keep her safe."

"No, Stiles—"

Charlie drew back. Stiles's arms began to tighten around her a bit more, but she pulled away insistently. Again, she grabbed his shoulders, but this time it was to push him back far enough to look him full in the face with enough distance to at least kind of mask her vulnerability and insecurity. Though it was unlikely she'd be able to do that with Stiles.

"Stiles," she said, forcing herself to look at him, her expression serious. "This? What you just saw? That has been happening for like a month now, and I'm fine. I'll be fine. Lydia won't."

Stiles opened and closed his mouth a few times, a doubtful look on his face. "Charlie—"

"They want to kill her, Stiles," Charlie interrupted. "They think she's the kanima—they want to kill Lydia. You were there for Derek's speech. Do you think he was kidding around? Because I sure as hell don't!"

As she spoke, Stiles's eyes fell shut with regret, like she was forcing him to remember some sort of traumatic incident he had forced out of his mind. He exhaled sharply and lifted his hand to his head, scratching at his forehead with his thumb. Immediately, she could tell that there was something wrong. Something _else_ wrong. Something he wasn't telling her. And suddenly it was her turn to demand more information.

"Hey!" she growled, poking him hard in the shoulder and making him wince. He looked up at her with a slightly accusatory expression, but she ignored it and stared him down. "What aren't you saying?"

Stiles returned her stare for a second, but folded like cheap suit. Which was probably the best decision for him, because she wasn't going to stop coming for answers any time soon. Letting out a sigh, he reached into his pocket and pulled out his phone. "Something happened in econ," he murmured, punching buttons on his phone. "Lydia did this while she was supposed to be answering a question on the board."

He held up to the phone to her face so she could see the image. It was a chalkboard, which was normal enough. What was strange was the thing written on it. It didn't look like English, but it had an oddly familiar shape to it. Charlie blinked, taking in the image for a moment. And then she saw it. She had always been good at recognizing visual patterns and she knew what this was. It was a mirror image.

SOMEBODY HELP ME.

The words felt like a kick to the gut. There they were—the words Lydia would never actually say out loud—spelled out on the chalkboard for everybody to see. That is if people were smart enough to recognize them for what they were, which, quite frankly, was unlikely given the average IQ of people in Beacon Hills. Most of them seemed to manage an almost impossible degree of obliviousness. To them it just looked like some crazy scribbles, but Charlie saw what it really was. It was a silent cry—a scream into the void. Well she wasn't screaming into the void anymore. Charlie was listening.

Charlie swore. Under normal circumstances she might have sworn loudly—that was her nature—but this time, with everything falling to pieces around her, it came out as a quiet hiss. Then her eyes snapped up to Stiles's. "It's not her," she said harshly. "It's not Lydia. She's not the kanima. I don't know what's going on with her—I don't know what this—" she held the phone up to his face to show him the photo "—what this is, but _that_ is not it."

"Hey—I know," Stiles replied immediately. "It's not her. There's no way it's her."

"But it's not our opinion that matters," Charlie muttered back. "It's Derek's." She looked at Stiles with wide, terrified eyes. "What are we gonna do, Stiles? I've been trying, and I can't think of anything. I don't know—"

"We're gonna find Scott and we're gonna figure it out," he whispered, cutting her off. "You said it yourself. That's what we do. We figure things out." Finally, Stiles got up to his feet and held a hand out to her. Blowing out a long, shaky breath, Charlie took his hand and allowed herself to be pulled to her feet. "Come on," Stiles said, still looking at her with that fear and concern.

"Where's Scott?" she demanded probably a little more bluntly than she needed to, overcompensating for that sensation of panic that just wouldn't leave her behind.

"He's right outside," Stiles said, jerking his head in the direction of the library door. "Come on."

Keeping his hand wrapped around hers, Stiles pulled Charlie after him. Scott was waiting for them just on the other side of the door. His big, brown, genuine eyes flickered down to their entwined hands before looking at her seriously. "Charlie, I'm not going to let anything happen to Lydia. I promise."

"That's great, Scott," Charlie shot back, "but what exactly do you propose that we do? All evidence suggests that Erica and Isaac are making their move during chemistry class and chemistry class starts—" With morbidly perfect comedic timing, she was immediately cut off by the shrill ring of a bell, a sound that made her heart jump in panic. The universe had a screwed up sense of humor. "Now," she spat bitterly, throwing her hands in the air. "Chemistry class starts now."

Immediately she set off for the classroom, walking with fast, jerky movements. She heard the squeaking of shoes against linoleum tile behind her as Stiles and Scott took off as well, trying to catch up with her. Her mind was racing at a million miles a minute, but how fast she was thinking didn't exactly matter if it didn't land on something useful. Oh, crap, the door was already in sight. "Okay," she murmured, slowing down her pace as they came to the threshold. "We've got about fifteen seconds to find out what Derek's going to do and come up with a plan to stop him. I'm open to any ideas."

"Derek's not going to kill her unless he has proof," Scott hissed urgently.

"Right," Stiles agreed. "So he tests her like he did with Jackson."

Charlie nodded her head in agreement. Scott was right. Derek might be proverbially swimming in the moral grey area these days, but he wasn't a monster. And he wasn't careless. There was no way that he was just going to start picking off suspects until he just happened to get the right one. "Okay," she murmured, still bobbing her head. "So we cut off their access to Lydia. They need her to be in contact with that paralytic goo stuff, right? They can't test her if they can't get near her. And they've got to be careful handling the stuff or they're on the floor."

"Exactly," Stiles said, nodding his head. "But the question is when and where."

The three of them turned to look at Lydia. She was sitting there, strangely carefree-looking for someone who had just had a mental 'episode' in front of a class filled with people. But then again that was Lydia's specialty. _Looking_ like she didn't care. She pursed her lips a little and flipped idly through her notebook. Then something right behind Lydia's pulled her attention, and that thing was blonde. Well, both of them were.

"I think here and now," Scott murmured.

Erica and Isaac both strolled into the room, smiles on their faces and murder in their eyes. The two of them even looked kind of the same, with their smirks and 'his' and 'hers' leather jackets. They were enjoying this. They were enjoying trying to kill Lydia. It looked like they were playing some kind of game.

Across the room, the opposing groups caught each others' eye, staring each other down. Almost in unison, Charlie, Stiles, and Scott looked between Lydia and the two members of Derek's pack. Allison hadn't gotten to class yet, which meant that Lydia was sitting there on her own, and empty seat on either side of her. Isaac and Erica made a move towards the girl, and immediately Stiles and Scott darted forwards, dropping into place on either side of her. Isaac and Erica stopped short, shrugged, and made their way to the table behind Lydia, strolling slowly like they had all the time in the world.

Sucking in a quick breath, Charlie took her seat at another nearby table, but her eyes never left Isaac and Erica. They hadn't given up—not yet. And they were staring at Lydia like she was a meal. Isaac must have sensed her staring, because he took his eyes off Lydia for just long enough to shoot her a smile and another wink. Charlie felt her face contort in perturbation, returning his wink with a grimace.

"Hey," a confused feminine voice said from somewhere to her left, making her jump in her seat. Charlie looked up to find Allison standing next to her, dropping her bag and sliding into the seat next to Charlie. Sensing that there was something wrong, a frown tugged down at the corner of her lips and her eyebrows were furrowed in confusion. "What's going on?" Allison whispered. "Why is everybody all panicked?"

Charlie let her eyes flicker to the menacing pair one last time before glancing at Allison. "Isaac and Erica," she replied as quietly as she could. "They're here for Lydia."

"Here for—what does that mean?" Allison hissed back.

"It means that we dropped the ball," Charlie replied, feeling her stomach continue to tie itself into knots. "It means we didn't anticipate." She covered her face with her hands and then let them slide up so that her fingers embedded in her hair, pulling slightly as she did so. "How could I not have seen this coming?"

"Charlie—you're starting to freak me out," Allison insisted. "What's going on?"

Charlie removed her hands from her face and turned to face Allison. "Derek's trying to find out who the kanima is."

Allison blinked and the forehead that was wrinkled with confusion smoothed out as she processed Charlie's words. "And he thinks it's Lydia?" Allison demanded. "Oh my God."

"That about sums it up," Charlie murmured.

"What are we going to do?"

Charlie just threw her hands in the air and let them his the desk again with a loud thwack. "Keep them away from her?" she said, shaking her head a bit. "Form a human shield? Use vicious rhetoric?"

But before Charlie could throw out any more suggestions, she was stopped by a sound she found slightly more annoying than nails on chalkboard. That sound being Mr. Harris's voice. "Einstein once said that two things are infinite: the universe and human stupidity."

"That's great," Charlie muttered under her breath. "They should put that on one of the motivational posters outside the principal's office."

"I'm not sure about the universe," Mr. Harris barreled on circling around to Stiles and clapping a patronizing hand on his shoulder, "but I myself have encountered infinite stupidity. So, to combat the plague of ignorance in my class, you're going to combine efforts to through a round of group experiments."

"Why?!"

In her panic, she just blurted out the word. And, of course, her exclamation made everyone stop talking and look at her. There were a few moments of silence before that typical round of snickering that accompanied somebody making an ass out of themselves in public. Mr. Harris turned his beady eyes in her direction and shot her a contemptuous glare. "Thank you, Ms. Oswin, for providing us with such an immediate example of Einstein's assertion."

"Always happy to be of help, sir," she said, giving him a facetious salute.

After rolling his eyes, Mr. Harris moved on. "Alright. Let's see if two heads really indeed better than one. Or in Mr. Stilinski's case less than one. Erica, you'll take the first station. You'll start—"

Almost immediately about a dozen hands shot in the air, more than a few of them waving frantically as they volunteered to be paired with her. Or, more accurately, placed in the vicinity of her boobs. Charlie couldn't help but roll her eyes at their enthusiasm. And then she rolled them even more heavily at the self-satisfied expression on Erica's face.

"Ugh," Harris muttered in exasperation. "I didn't ask for volunteers. Put your hormonal little hands down." Slowly and dejectedly, the hands were retracted from the air. "Start with Mr. McCall."

Slowly, everybody was paired up. Luckily Mr. Harris put Allison and Lydia together, buying them just a little more time and a little more security. Immediately, Allison scrambled to her feet and dropped into the now-vacant seat next to Lydia, glancing at Charlie in reassurance. Charlie let her eyes fall shut and exhaled, lowering her head so her forehead pressed against the surface of the desk. They had bought themselves at the very least a couple of minutes. She didn't even bother lifting it when she heard the chair next to her scrape against the floor as someone took the seat next to her.

"Hello, partner."

At the sound of that coy, almost lilting voice, Charlie threw herself back into the sitting position and her head whipped around, only to find herself once again confronted with blonde hair and dimples. Next her eyes sought Stiles. When she turned towards the table where he was sitting, she found that he was already looking at her, his eyes wide with anxiety. Charlie returned the look and her mouth opened and closed a few times, like she was trying to talk to him but there was no way for him to hear. She as no idea what to do—a feeling which was becoming all too familiar to her. It was only when Harris shouted the word 'begin!' and snapped them out of it that they managed to make themselves look like semi-functional human beings.

At first Charlie didn't say anything. Everyone else began the experiment, the glass beakers and flasks clinking lightly together as they began to measure and pour out the ingredients, but Charlie just glared at Isaac. He didn't seem that bothered by it though. "Um, Charlie," he said casually. "I think we're supposed to start the experiment."

Charlie felt her jaw twitch. The panic had been sidelined for a moment, making room for pure, unadulterated rage. She reached for her notebook and flipped through the pages to get to the right reaction before slamming it down on the counter. Skimming the notes quickly, she grabbed the bottle filled with hydrochloric acid and poured what was definitely too much of it into the graduated cylinder before dumping unceremoniously into the Erlenmeyer flask. She couldn't give half of two shits how this experiment turned out.

"You know, you might want to be a bit more careful with that stuff," Isaac mused idly. "If you blow up the classroom, I'm pretty sure that you automatically fail the class. Also, we're not supposed to be using hydrochloric acid."

"Wow," Charlie spat sarcastically. "I wonder where that sits on my list of priorities right now." She dumped out the acid and rinsed out the beaker before starting again with Isaac staring at her the whole freaking time.

"You okay, Charlie?" Isaac asked, his voice more sly and calculating than genuine. Like he was trying to bait her. He cocked his head to the side and squinted a bit, looking at her with sarcastic concern. "You know, you look a little stressed out. Are you worried about something?"

"Don't even go there, Isaac," she snapped. "Or you know what? Don't go anywhere. Don't talk at all. Just sit there and look pretty."

"You think I'm pretty?" Isaac drawled out, that goddamn cocky smirk back on his face.

"You won't be anymore if I throw this in your face," she muttered, holding up the bottle of hydrochloric acid again and waving it around a bit.

"Well that sounds a little uncalled for," he drawled out in response. "I haven't even done anything. Well….not yet anyway."

Charlie slammed her beaker down on the table and rounded on Isaac. "I know what you guys are planning," she snapped. "How can you be going along with this?"

"With what?" Isaac said, blinking at her with feigned innocence. Charlie's eyes narrowed into slits and then a mock expression of realization crossed Isaac's face. "Oh! You mean the whole 'killing Lydia' thing? Well first off there's the bit where she murdered my dad. Follow that up with me being the subject of a state-wide manhunt…..I'd say those were pretty big motivators."

"It's. Not. Her."

Charlie enunciated each word carefully, and her voice was hard and gritty. But Isaac just shrugged, a theatrical wince covering his face. "I guess we'll see."

Charlie's hand clenched around the graduated cylinder as she measured out the next reagent. Her grip was so tight she was almost afraid it would shatter. "God damnit," she said, more to herself than anyone else. "This is just great. Derek's recruiting a freaking cult of homicidal lycanthropes."

At that, Isaac actually started chuckling, and that made her want to strangle him a little bit more. She just didn't get it. How could that sweet, shy, considerate have turned into this?

"Cult of homicidal lycanthropes," Isaac repeated, bobbing his head and stroking at his chin a little bit as he considered her words. "I like that. Has anybody told you that you have a way with words?"

"Usually they just tell me to shut up."

"Well, you do," Isaac continued, looking at her with a weird intensity that somehow seemed to be sincere and sarcastic all at once. "Very compelling." Then he looked at her and snapped his fingers, like a thought had suddenly occurred to him. "You know what—maybe you could help me with something. With the whole 'fugitive from justice' thing I had going on I've fallen behind in some classes. Do you think you could help me catch up in English? I'm not that great of a writer. Maybe we could get together and study some time. You and me."

Charlie scrunched up her face in an expression of confusion. Of all the turns she had expected this conversation to take, Isaac petitioning for some one-on-one study time was not one of them. And then she added it up. Her eyes darted back and forth, scanning his face. "Oh my God," she whispered in a tone of realization. "You're hitting on me?"

Isaac let out a casual sigh and jerked his head to the side noncommittally. "I guess if you have to ask, I'm clearly not doing it well enough," he said with a cheeky smile.

She hadn't thought it physiologically possible, but she felt her blood pressure tick up even higher as the rage took her. At that point she abandoned even the charade of trying to do the experiment correctly. Abandoning the chemicals and glassware, she shifted in her seat so she was squaring her shoulders against him. "You're hitting on me while you're trying to kill my best friend," she growled. "You know what, Isaac? Congratulations on this newfound confidence. I'm happy for you—really, I am. But I think I liked you better when you suffered from extreme shyness. At least then you kind of had a conscience."

For a moment a crack in that façade appeared. Charlie wasn't sure if she had hurt his feelings or surprised him, but she really didn't give a crap. She was done. She was beyond done with Isaac, with Derek, with Erica—with all of them.

A loud ding echoed in the room, making everybody look up and towards the teacher's desk. Harris was sitting there with his hand hovering above that little silver bell. "Switch!"

Charlie didn't even bother saying goodbye to Isaac before grabbing her books and jumping to her feet. She caught Allison's eye and darted to the table, filling the seat as soon as Allison had vacated it and letting out a tiny sigh of relief as she did so. "Hey," she whispered breathlessly as she shot Lydia a quick smile, trying and failing to maintain some outward appearance of calm.

"Hey…" Lydia drawled out, eyeing her with suspicion as she began to do her work.

At the table in front of her, Stiles turned around in his seat, trying to make sure that Lydia wasn't being threatened and that Charlie was okay. She gave him a tiny thumbs up. It didn't seem to make him feel all that much better, but he turned around to face forwards again. But any calm that might have developed was immediately erased when Isaac took the seat next to Stiles. Now Charlie found herself shoved into a situation that was fraught not only with danger, but with a heavy dose of awkward. Stiles and the guy who had just hit on her sitting one foot away from each other. Oh, yeah. This was going to go great.

"Son of a bitch!"

"Excuse me?" Lydia interjected, making a face at her.

"Oh," Charlie muttered evasively. "Nothing. Hangnail." She lifted her hand and waved her fingers around before dropping it back in her lap.

"Not a good enough reason to start swearing loudly in class," Lydia chided, shaking her head in a condescending way.

Charlie chuckled a little too loudly at the sass, and immediately looked away from Lydia, craning her neck to take in her surroundings. The way the chemistry class was divided, Charlie felt kind of like she was standing on a chessboard. Each table was a square, each one of them was a piece, and everybody was trying to maneuver themselves into the right position. Tactics—that was what it was. Scott was in the far corner with Danny, Stiles was paired with Isaac, and Allison and Erica were sitting in the table next to her. The way all of them were distributed seemed to defy the law of probability. Thirty something people in the class, and most of them still ended up in a standoff.

"Earth to Charlie!"

The sudden appearance of manicured fingers snapping in front of her face forced Charlie away from her thoughts and back to the sad reality that was chemistry class. Lydia was staring at her, her eyebrows shooting up towards her hairline. "I'm not sure if you grasp the concept of 'group projects', but usually it involves more than one person doing the work."

"Right," Charlie mumbled. She began rifling through her papers, trying to find the right notes. She felt Lydia staring at her the whole time, a weird, grimacing frown marring her bright red lips. Finally, she let out a loud scoff and threw her hands in the air in frustration.

"Okay—what the hell is going on with everyone today?"

Charlie stopped going through her papers and looked up at Lydia. She tried to make herself look as innocent, but it ended up being that sort of 'who, me?' expression she used to get when her dad found her breaking into his box of old baseball cards—the type of look that made you seem more guilty rather than less. "What, um, what do you mean?"

Lydia tilted her head to the side and wrinkled her nose in an expression that clearly spelled out, 'oh, please'. "Come on, Charlie," she clucked. "Scott and Stiles are being weirder than usual, you're all jumpy, and Allison's telling me not to talk to Erica or Isaac—like I'd want to in first place. Don't even get me started on the way Erica's been hitting on Scott."

"Erica's been hitting on Scott?" Charlie mumbled, only half-listening to her friend.

Lydia let out a snort and rolled her eyes. "Um, yeah," she said like it was the most obvious thing in the world. "And her flirting is about as subtle as her cleavage. I mean I'm all for being assertive and going for what you want, but grabbing a guy's thigh in the middle of chemistry class? Kind of desperate. Plus Allison's all cool about it, pretending not to be jealous while blondie is feeling up her ex. Like I said. Weird. If discount Pamela Anderson was rubbing up on my ex, I would be a little jealous." Then Lydia cocked her head to the side and her eyes flicked to Charlie, narrowing them slightly. "Though I'm not exactly surprised that you didn't notice."

Charlie's eyes, which had traveled back to what looked like some hostile conversation going on between Stiles and Isaac, snapped to Lydia's. The words were pointed, and slightly judgmental-sounding. Charlie dropped her papers and looked at Lydia. "What the hell is that supposed to mean?" Charlie demanded in a slightly accusatory tone.

"Hand me that stirrer," Lydia said, intentionally avoided the question.

Charlie snatched up the glass rod and placed it in Lydia's hand. "Come on, Lydia. What's that supposed to mean?"

Lydia shrugged her shoulders primly before returning to her work, forcing a casual exterior as she measured out a fine white powder into a clear liquid while stirring. "Oh, I don't know. Maybe it was the fact that a certain someone was making 'sexy eyes' at you for a solid ten minutes." Charlie blinked uncomfortably and broke eye contact, returning to her notes and making Lydia roll her eyes. "Seriously?" Lydia demanded. "The second something moderately interesting happens and you shut down on me like that?"

"Nothing interesting is happening," Charlie insisted, finally finding the right page in her notes. She dropped the notebook on the table and began to help Lydia with the measurements. "It's all boring on the Charlie front."

"Oh please," Lydia said with a roll of her eyes. "The way tall and broody was looking at you? He either wanted to crazy murder you or crazy make out with you. I'm going for option number two."

"I am not acknowledging this conversation."

"And why not?" Lydia said, making a face at Charlie. "You've got this constipated look on your face all the time—you really need to cut loose. Have a little reckless fun. If things aren't going anywhere with Stiles, why not find some sort of extracurricular activity to pass the time?"

As soon as Lydia mentioned Stiles's name, Charlie swore internally and looked up, scanning the room. The reaction was almost instantaneous. Isaac, who was sitting in front of her, straightened in his seat and turned around to look at her, surprised, confused, and possibly slightly disturbed. Great. Now Isaac was clued in on her feelings towards Stiles—stupid goddamn werewolf hearing—and he was sitting directly next to Stiles. All of the sudden Charlie felt her heart seize in her chest. Crap. She didn't even want to know what that conversation was going to turn into.

The reaction she hadn't expected was the one from Erica. The blonde's head snapped away from Allison and she looked at Charlie contemptuously. It wasn't the contemptuous part that was surprising—Charlie pretty used to that by this point. It was the fact that she reacted at all. When the two of them made eye contact, Erica actually bared her teeth a little bit. Charlie grimaced and ducked her head down again. With everything else that was going on, she did not have time for a passive-aggressive blonde.

"I will actually, literally pay you cash to stop talking," she muttered, capping the bottle of white powder before putting it to the side.

Lydia let out a scoff and waved her pen in Charlie's face. "See. Like I said. Uptight and jumpy. Seriously, what is going on today?"

Ding!

Mr. Harris's angry, bitter voice filled the room again. "Switch!"

Under normal circumstances, Charlie would have been grateful to escape Lydia's closed-captioning of her romantic and social life but today was not one of those days. As all of her classmates began to mill about, moving to their next destination, she stayed put. "Um, Charlie," Lydia said, raising her eyebrows pointedly. "This is the part where you get up and leave."

Charlie gritted her teeth, but still got out of the chair and made her way to one of the last available seats. Next to Greenburg. As she approached the seat he smiled and waved in greeting, but Charlie didn't bother responding, making him drop that waving hand in defeat. It looked a little sad, actually, but Charlie just sat down and immediately fixed her eyes on Lydia's desk, waiting and worrying. And then it happened. Isaac took the seat, smirking widely. It felt like getting stabbed in the gut. They had failed, utterly and miserably. And Lydia was about to pay for it.

"Get up."

A harsh, female voice broke through Charlie's internal mental tailspin. She tore her gaze away from Lydia and Isaac to find Erica looming over the table, only it wasn't Charlie she was talking to. It was Greenburg. The boy stared up at Erica for a few moments, like he was in shock or something, and then immediately did as he was told and scrambled away from the desk. Charlie's hand clenched her hands into fists and her nails dug into her palms, but she kept her eyes fixed on Lydia rather than the hostile force occupying the chair next to her. Or at least she tried to—Erica wasn't making it very easy. Out of the corner of Charlie's eye she could see the girl staring at her, head propped up on her hand and her bright red lower lip sticking out in a pout. Neither of them even bothered pretending that they were doing the experiment. It was just Charlie staring at Lydia and Erica staring at Charlie.

"Why the hell are you here?" Charlie muttered out of the corner of her mouth, finally turning to face Erica. "Seriously, what do you want from me?"

Erica batted her impossibly dark eyelashes and made those innocent doe eyes at Charlie. "Well maybe I just want to get to know you better," she said in that sickly sweet tone.

Usually Charlie would have been all for one of those games of passive aggressive double-speak and snarky girl-fighting, but right now she really didn't have the patience for it. Charlie let out a bitter snort and ground her teeth together. "Okay," Charlie bit out. "You don't like me. Fine, whatever, I get it. Point made."

Erica laughed in response. She shook her head a bit, sending those luminous curls bouncing about, and looked at Charlie again, only this time it wasn't with that wide-eyed faux naivety. It was with burning hatred. She leaned in closer to Charlie, so her voice could come out as a menacing whisper. "No," Erica said, curling her lip so that the light glinted off of her impossibly white teeth. "No, you really don't."

Charlie exhaled sharply in disbelief narrowed her eyes at the girl, studying her face carefully. "What exactly did I do to you?" she asked. "Seriously—I've racked my brain and I can't think of a single thing."

Erica was quiet for a moment, allowing another hostile smile to pull at her lips. "You know, I actually wanted to be friends with you?"

Immediately, Charlie did a double take. Of all the things that Charlie could have expected from Erica, this was the last one. Erica sneered at Charlie's confusion, like it had somehow validated all of Erica's conclusions about her. "Yeah," Erica said, nodding her head. "Charlie Oswin. The new girl who shows up on her first day already part of the cool crowd. Smart, funny, nice. Well, nice-ish. Friend of the fashionista and the nerd. I used to want for you to notice me so badly. Like if you would just decide to be my friend, things would get better for me. The poor sad little seizure girl. But you never bothered. You never looked at me twice. I wasn't relevant enough for you—I just faded into the background. But there I was, feeling like I _needed_ you." That smile on her face grew, her painted lips looking like they were stained with blood. "Well, Charlie Oswin, I don't need you anymore. And I'm not part of the background."

A tiny, disbelieving laugh burbled out of Charlie's throat as she looked at the girl. "That's what this is?" she muttered, unable to conceal her slightly manic smile. "This is a power play thing—a competition? Well I hate to break it to you, Erica, but you're playing against yourself. I'm not interested. I don't have the time for this game, and I'm not going to be a part of it."

"Don't kid yourself, Charlie," Erica shot back. "We're all a part of it. All the time."

Then Charlie felt Erica's hand grip her leg, sliding up it a bit until she was grasping her thigh. Charlie could feel the points of claws grazing against the thin fabric of her jeans, but she didn't look down. She wouldn't give Erica the satisfaction. But then Erica let out a sigh and turned away from Charlie. Frowning to herself, Charlie followed the girl's line of sight and found herself looking at Stiles. "You know, the two of you _could_ be a cute couple. It really is too bad."

"And what the hell is that supposed to mean?" Charlie drawled out, quickly getting tired of the conversation.

"Oh, come on, Charlie," Erica said, a false sort of sympathy in her tone. "Do you really think that he's over her? That he's ever going to be over her? Eight years is a long time and you've been here for how long? A few months? Sure you guys have all that adorable banter that you love so much, but do you really think that's going to replace a lifetime of being head over heels for another girl—your best friend?"

Charlie didn't respond. She pressed her lips together in a thin line and didn't say a word. After hearing Lydia, all Erica could know was that she liked Stiles—not that they were together. And she wasn't going to give in to the goading. But that didn't mean that she didn't feel that small knot of insecurity curling into a pit in the base of her stomach. Erica must have heard that slight irregularity in her heartbeat, though, because she let out a small, superior laugh and those claws that rested gently against her leg dug in a bit, just enough to cause the smallest trickle of blood to leak into the black fabric of her jeans. Charlie twitched in pain, gripping the edge of the desk, but didn't make a sound.

"Tell me Charlie, how does it feel?" Erica growled through her teeth. All of that unctuous, false earnestness was gone, leaving behind a sort of animalistic anger. "How does it feel to be he one who doesn't get what she wants—the one who watches in the corner? How does it feel to be the one who's weak?"

Erica snarled and her eyes flashed yellow as she leered at Charlie, but that intimidation technique didn't have its desired effect. An involuntary bark of laughter forced its way out of Charlie's throat. When she turned to Erica this time, there was a wide smile on her face. Erica leaned a little bit backwards, evidently off-put by Charlie's mirth.

"You think I'm weak?"

Reaching down, Charlie covered Erica's hand which was still resting on her thigh with her own. She splayed her fingers out, placing her hand so matched Erica's. Then she pressed down, driving each of Erica's claws deeper into her flesh. She didn't even flinch a tiny rivulets of blood sprung forth and traveled down her leg. This was a pain she was prepared for. It was her turn to show her fangs. The fact that hers were only metaphorical didn't make the least bit of difference.

"Do you really think that you scare me?" she murmured in condescending tone that sounded almost amused. "That you can flash those yellow eyes and I'm going to start quaking in my boots? The last guy who came for me and my friends? He's dead now. I shot him. Stiles and Allison lit him on fire. Scott kicked him so hard in the chest he flew a solid forty feet and collided with a tree. And his eyes weren't yellow, they were red. I have looked death in the face over and over again, and you actually expect me to be intimidated but some Full Moon Barbie with an inferiority complex and a bone to pick with me? My dreams are scarier than your worst nightmares. You are a chipmunk compared to the things I've seen and experienced. So, Erica, kindly go screw yourself. And why don't you put those claws away before you break a nail."

The staring contest that followed had Charlie wishing she had put more eyeliner on this morning, but both girls glowered at each other with equal ferocity. Neither of them blinked, neither of them backed down, nor did they have any intention of doing so. In the end, though, neither of them ended up winning. The clock timed out first.

Ding!

"Time," Mr. Harris shouted, making them all look towards his desk. Erica snatched her hand back and away from Charlie's leg, making Charlie force back a hiss of pain as the marred skin met the cold air of the chemistry classroom. "If you've catalyzed the reaction correctly," Harris continued, "you should be looking at a crystal."

Charlie's eyes strayed down to the beaker in front of it—the one she and Erica had barely touched. It was filled with some grey, coarse powder which kind of resembled what she thought asbestos would look like. She wrinkled her nose at it and tapped at the glass with the tip of her pen, pushing it a little bit further away from her.

"Now. For the part of the experiment I know you'll all enjoy. You can eat it."

Erica picked up the beaker and held it in front of Charlie's face, her fingertips still red with Charlie's blood. "What do you say, Charlie? Want to give it a try?"

Charlie was about to make a snappish reply, but before she could Erica's focus shifted. "On the other hand," the blonde drawled out, "it looks like the fun's about to start."

Cold fear shot through Charlie's veins. She didn't even have to see the direction Erica was nodding to know where to look. At Lydia's table, Isaac was holding a clear, perfectly formed crystal with a pair of tongs. Jackson had said they _fed_ him some paralytic goo. Isaac wasn't touching the crystal—not with his hands. Lydia was about to eat the freaking thing. This was how they were going to do it. This was how they were going to get her.

"Lydia!"

The crystal was inches away from her mouth when Scott shouted Lydia's name and jumped out of his chair. Everybody in the classroom wheeled around to look at him standing there. Lydia twisted around in her seat and eyed him with an expression that clearly said 'stop embarrassing me'. "What?!" she demanded in a defensive tone.

Scott looked around the classroom, registering all the blank faces staring at him, and slowly sat back down. Charlie watched in horror as Lydia raised the thing to her lips. The crunch almost echoed in Charlie's ears as she took a bite. And….nothing. Nothing happened. Charlie glanced at the clock, watching the second hand tick and waiting for some sort of response—trembling hands, losing her ability to sit straight. Listening to Stiles on that voicemail and watching Derek at the pool, it had only taken seconds for the kanima goop to take effect. With each second that ticked by, Charlie felt her heart drop just a little bit more until it was in the pit of her stomach, being eaten away by acid.

This was it. This was the confirmation that Derek needed.

"Would you look at that?" Erica's snide voice echoed in her ears. "It looks like it's our turn to go hunting."

**Hey! So I hope you guys liked it. I know Isaac seems like a bit of an ass, but, let's face it, he was kind of an ass at this point in the show. An adorable, cheeky ass, but an ass. And I want Charlie to be part of his transition from being part of Derek's pack to part of Scott's. He does like her, and her knocking him back is going to force him to reevaluate how he's acting. They will eventually become close, but I like to evolve my relationships over time. That's what I'm going for here.**

**As for her and Erica, catfight! I hope how they interacted made sense. Erica as a character was always bitter about the way she was treated before she became a werewolf (not that I blame her for that). There's a lot of hostility and jealousy in her. So the reason for her hating Charlie is partly to do with her proximity to Stiles, but it's also got other elements to it as well.**

**Anyways, I hope you liked it and please review!**


	19. Guess Who's Coming To Dinner

**Disclaimer: 'Teen Wolf' isn't mine. Shocking, right? But it's true. If there are any similarities in content or dialogue, it has probably originated with the show.**

**A huge thank you to TheMMMG, Sonny13, aPaperheaRt, Daenerys86, WinchesterDixonBros, fighter61998, AngelicBadass, bridget237, katiesgotagun, resinwhy, crimson sun06, Alaee301, CantCatchTomorrow, Gee Brittany, AmyRoxx123, mymi092, zvc56, onethousandmoths, NathalieOchIzabelle, SilverAdvenger12, meels234, Jane Smith, she.s. .one, Undeniable Weirness, Cameron, Just Anonymous, Guest, shy-lady, pomabcd, The Fountain Pen, purplepumpkineater, HopeForDuende, Always Smiling, Caliweiser, The City of Books, ellsosaurus, kickarseanime, Atomicity, OBSESSEDwithPOWERS, Bai, and Jane Smith for reviewing! You guys are awesome!**

Chapter 19 – Guess Who's Coming to Dinner

"Okay, so what the hell are we going to do?"

Charlie wasn't even sure who had asked the question. It honestly could have been any of them. They were all thinking the exact same thing. What the hell were they going to do?

It kind of felt like Charlie was moving through water. Like the air around her hand turned thick and soupy. It made it difficult to walk, difficult to breathe, even difficult to see straight. Was this what a panic attack felt like? That sensation of desperately needing to move but being completely unable to do so? Because Charlie felt like she needed to move. She could feel a sort of tense vibration in her arms. She wanted to run, she wanted to hit, she wanted to throw things on the floor, but she just couldn't do it. She could hear her own voice screaming in her head until she went hoarse, but outwardly it was just quiet. She hadn't made a sound.

As soon as the bell rang at the end of chemistry class, she, Stiles, Scott, and Allison all darted out of the room, practically running into each other in the desperate attempt to get some place they could actually talk about the problem. They shuffled through the halls as the rest of the students made their way to cafeteria until they found themselves in Coach Finstock's office. It was only when they closed the door behind them that Charlie found her voice again.

"We have to tell her," Charlie said as she turned around to face the other three. "We have to tell Lydia what's going on."

"W—what?" Scott stammered out. "Charlie, we can't tell her."

"You heard me," Charlie said, swallowing heavily and nodding almost manically. "We need to tell Lydia. We should have done it a while ago—this has gone on way, _way_ to long. Whatever Peter did to her it's affecting her mind, her body, and now Derek's going after her for it." She let out a shaky breath and looked between all of them, her eyes either defiant or pleading—she didn't really know. "How is she supposed to be able to protect herself if she doesn't know what the hell is going on!"

"We're going to protect her," Scott insisted. "We can save her."

"Oh, come on, Scott," Charlie said with a bitter roll of her eyes. "That isn't any kind of justification. She deserves to know!"

"We can't tell her," Allison whispered, making Charlie round on her. "Not yet. It's not like we can just walk up to her and say 'Hi, Lydia—someone thinks you're a lizard monster and wants to kill you'. There's no way she would believe us, and even if she did, making her panic isn't going to help anybody."

"You think that she doesn't already sense it?" Charlie hissed. "You think she doesn't already know that there's something going on? News flash, guys—we're not exactly the most subtle people in the world and a lot of weird shit has happened! She knows we're keeping things from her!"

Charlie turned away from the rest of them, driving her hands into her hair and pulling at it until that slight stinging of her scalp gave her some sort of release. And even that didn't help. Allison was right. Charlie knew she was right. Telling Lydia now would be a complete disaster, but not telling her…..God, she didn't know which would be worse. Why did this always have to happen—why did she always have to be put in a position where she had to make a choice. But for now Allison was right. Telling Lydia wasn't going to make Derek go away. Telling her would just make her panic, and that definitely wasn't going to help anyone. But rationalizing the continued secrecy sure as hell didn't make Charlie feel any better. She turned to Stiles, the last holdout, the question in her eyes.

Stiles's jaw clenched and he ducked his head down a bit—that move he always made when he regretted something. "We can't tell her. Not now—not yet."

That was it. That was the answer. And they were probably right. But that didn't mean that it felt right. She let out a laugh, making Stiles wince, and threw her hands in the air before letting them collapse back down to her sides. "So what, then?" she demanded. "What do we do?"

The lot of them just stayed quiet for a moment, looking at each other. "Derek's outside waiting for Lydia," Scott finally said, breaking the silence.

"Waiting to kill her?" Allison asked. Well, sort of asked. It was phrased as a question, but it didn't really sound like one. Everybody already knew what the answer was.

Scott nodded weakly. "If he thinks she's the kanima, yes. Especially after what happened at the pool."

"It's not her," Charlie and Stiles both said, almost in unison.

Scott turned to face them both, a pitying sort of look in his eye. "Look, guys…..she didn't pass the test. Nothing happened."

"Oh that's great," Charlie snapped, waving her arms around a bit. "Suddenly we know things for sure. Suddenly all this supernatural bullshit has a hard and fast rulebook that we need to freaking consult! Derek is making this up as he goes along. I mean he admitted to us outside that pool that all he knew were rumors. And then suddenly he has this test? I don't buy it. There's no way it's a sure thing. Lydia is _not_ the kanima."

"It doesn't matter if she is the kanima or not because Derek thinks it's her," Allison whispered. "So—so either we can convince him he's wrong, or we've got to come up with some sort of way to protect her."

"Well, I don't think he's gonna do anything here," Scott murmured. "Not here."

"Yeah," Charlie said, nodding in agreement. "Not even Derek's stupid enough to try something in such a public place."

"But what about after school?" Allison demanded, her voice becoming a bit higher-pitched with her anxiety.

The four of them stared at each other in silence, none of them having anything to offer up. Charlie let out a groan and perched on the edge of her desk, covering her face with her hands. She felt a hand gripping her shoulder. She knew that grip—firm and gentle all at once. It was Stiles. Her eyes still closed, she reached up and covered his hand with hers. Instinctively the hands gripped each other tightly.

When Charlie opened her eyes again, she found Allison looking at her with an unreadable expression. She quickly released Stiles's hand and dropped her own back to her lap. "Derek's not going to stop trying," she said with a shrug. "Not as long as he has the idea in his head that it's her. And he's got three betas now. Four of them and four of us." She looked up at all of them with a forlorn expression. "How long are we going to be able to hold them off? A day? A week?"

"Charlie's right," Stiles said, bobbing his head in agreement. "We can't be everywhere all the time you guys. We need a permanent solution. And we need one pretty freaking fast."

Allison exhaled sharply, running her hands through her hair. "What if we can prove that Derek's wrong?" she demanded.

Stiles let out a bitter scoff. "By 3:00?"

"There could be something in the bestiary," Allison persisted.

"Oh, you mean the 900 page book written in archaic Latin that none of us can read?" Stiles demanded, her sarcasm becoming more pronounced as his anxiety rose. "Good luck with that!"

"Stiles," Charlie muttered, leveling him with a serious look. "Not helpful." She let out a sigh and ran her hands down her face. "And it's not 900 pages anymore."

Immediately Allison and Scott's heads snapped in Charlie's direction. "What do you mean?" Scott asked, his eyebrows furrowing in confusion.

"Charlie found the passage about the kanima," Stiles answered for her. He reached down to grab the backpack he had thrown on the floor when he entered the office. It took about two seconds of rooting around before he yanked out a folder that didn't seem to have anything to do with classes. He yanked out a couple of pages of what looked like elaborate doodles. He waved them around in the air for a moment before slamming them down on the desk. "There. That's everything on the kanima. But it's still freaking useless as long as we don't have anybody here who can read it!"

Charlie rubbed at her forehead to stave off the headache beginning to form as she anxiety coiled and twisted inside of her. When she looked at those papers it felt like they were mocking her. All the information was right there, but it wouldn't reveal itself. It kind of made her want to light the pages on fire. She wanted to tear them to pieces and scream. But Allison wasn't looking at them like that. She was looking at them with hope. "Actually," the girl whispered quietly, her eyebrows drawing together in thought, "I think I know somebody who might be able to translate it."

"We still need to buy time," Charlie insisted.

"Uh, I could talk to Derek," Scott suggested, shaking his head as he spoke. "Maybe convince him to give us a chance to prove that it isn't her?"

Charlie gritted her teeth, her jaw tightening with determination. "No," she said tightly. "I'll talk to Derek."

Scott's mouth dropped open as he looked at her, a doubtful expression crossing his face. He glanced between her and Stiles a moment before speaking. "Charlie….I'm not sure that's the best idea. Derek—he's—"

Charlie's eyes flashed angrily as she looked at Scott. Not that she was angry at him. But that fear that had eaten its way into her bones had become something else. And that chill she had felt? It wasn't there anymore. Her veins felt like they were on fire. It was anger. And she knew exactly where to channel it. "Oh, I know what Derek is," she growled. "I understand that son of a bitch. I understand that whole freaking family. He's making this up as he goes along, and he knows it. And I am going to gently remind him of that fact before I punch him in the trachea."

"Charlie—"

"I'm not asking, Scott," Charlie said with a shrug. She perched herself on the edge of the desk and stared evenly at him. "This is more of a general FYI."

Scott opened and closed his mouth a few times, looking back at Stiles again. Charlie had refused to let herself look at him while she came to her decision. She didn't want to see that look on his face again—the one from earlier today. The one he had worn when he found her curled up in a ball in the library, fighting off the ghost of Peter Hale. But she couldn't avoid it anymore.

Stiles had an oddly blank look on his face. It was restrained, like he was fighting with himself just underneath the surface. He pinched at the bridge of his nose and his jaw twitched violently before he spoke. "She's right," he finally said, making Charlie blink in surprise. She hadn't expected him to agree with her. She had expected more of what she usually got from Stiles—him calling her an idiot and trying to get her to stay out of trouble. He exhaled sharply and looked at her. "He actually listens when you talk. Plus there was that time you let him crash at your place….." The sentence trailed off and Stiles's face contorted into an expression of sad frustration. I definitely don't like the idea, but let's face it. If anyone convinces him it's gonna be you. He almost kind of trusts you." Then he turned to face Scott again. "You're going to be with her the whole freaking time. And I swear if anything—"

"Yeah, man," Scott said, nodding immediately. "Yeah. I got it." Then he looked around, fixing each of them with a meaningful look. "If anything happens, you guys, let me take care of it."

"What's that supposed to mean?" Allison asked.

"You guys can't heal like I do," he replied. "I just don't want you getting hurt."

Allison immediately rolled her eyes and reached for her bag. Charlie furrowed her eyebrows in confusion as the girl unzipped it, rifling around inside. She snatched out a hunk of black metal—some sort of mechanical device Charlie had never seen before. She gave the thing a shake and somehow it snapped open like it was spring-loaded or something to reveal a miniature crossbow. She looked at Scott pointedly—almost accusatorially. "I can take care of myself."

Charlie's eyes widened slightly looking at the things and she blew out a long breath. "I've got a number two pencil in my bag that's like crazy-sharp. Almost shiv-like. Plus, you know….lead poisoning….."

"Pencil lead is made of graphite," Stiles murmured absently, his level of distraction obviously pretty high at the moment. "It's just carbon. You can't get lead poisoning."

"Wow," Charlie drawled out. "Thanks, Wikipedia. What does your page on sarcasm say?"

"It doesn't say anything," he sighed back. "It's just a giant picture of your face."

"Why would you say that like it's a burn?" Charlie demanded. "That would be objectively awesome."

But Allison and Scott didn't hear her and Stiles bickering. The two of them were too busy staring deeply into each others' eyes, and that made Charlie avert hers. The two of them didn't get to have a lot of meaningful moments these days, and she sure as hell wasn't going to interrupt one of the few they had left. All of the sudden she was an intruder on a very private moment. So instead she focused very intently on her shoes. That is until she felt somebody move next to her. Charlie exhaled sharply and gripped the edge of the desk she was leaning against, only to find her hand brushing against another's. Her head snapped around and she found herself looking at Stiles who was staring straight out in front of him with a kind of serious expression. It looked like she was going to have one of those meaningful conversations herself. And that kind of scared the crap out of her. She wasn't good at meaningful.

"I know I tell you this pretty much every day," Stiles murmured quietly. "And you pretty much never listen to me. Like not ever. It's freaking infuriating how much you don't listen to me. At this point I'm pretty much expecting you to do exactly what you want to do no matter what I say to the point where I don't even say it anymore, but…." His voice trailed off into silence, and he finally turned to look at her. He was staring down at her with this—this look. Worried, scared, concerned. "Don't do anything stupid. And be careful."

"Didn't you hear about my number two pencil?" she asked, blinking at him innocently. "I sharpened that bad boy this morning. I'm covered."

"Charlie, I'm seri—"

Leaning over, Charlie pressed her lips to his, cutting him off. Stiles inhaled sharply in surprise, but kissed back, one of his hands instinctively moving up to cup her cheek. The kiss was soft and lingering, kind of like a promise. A promise that they would both be okay. Charlie pulled back just far enough to look in Stiles's eyes, gauging his reaction. He glanced away from her, rubbing at the back of his neck and letting out a small, nervous laugh. "What, uh…." He looked back up at her with questioningly. "What happened to the whole 'keeping it to ourselves' thing?" he asked quietly.

Charlie pressed her lips together in a thin smile and nudged him with her elbow. "Yeah—that wasn't working for me. Turns out I don't like not being able to kiss you whenever the hell

I feel like it. And anyways you know me. I _suck_ at keeping secrets."

A tiny smile pulled at the corner of Stiles's lips, and this time that smile actually reached his eyes. And then Charlie felt herself smiling too. It was only when they heard a loud, pointed cough that they stopped smiling and jumped apart from each other. Clearing her throat, Charlie tucked her hair behind her ears self-consciously before looking up at the two other people in their room—the ones who were being oddly quiet. Scott had that goofy smile on his face—the one that she was getting all too used to seeing lately. Allison, though….that was a different story entirely. Honestly, it kind of looked like someone had hit her over the head with an incredibly heavy, blunt object. Her eyes glazed over and her jaw went kind of slack, and honestly she looked a bit like she was concussed.

"Okay, then," Charlie said, ignoring that hot flushed feeling that had already started creeping up her neck. "So Scott and I will meet up by the locker rooms after classes are out, Allison'll get the kanima passage translated, and Stiles…you stick with Lydia. Keep her inside and in crowded areas. Controlled spaces. Don't give Derek an opening. Sound good?"

"What about after school ends?" Stiles said, throwing a hand in the air and letting it collapse defeatedly. "How can we keep her in a controlled space then? And how am I supposed to keep an eye on her?"

"We were supposed to study together after school," Allison said suddenly, shaking off her dazed look. She turned to Charlie, her widened with the urgency of the situation. "The three of us—we had study plans, right?"

Charlie blew out a long breath and bounced up and down on the balls of her feet before wandering over to Allison, leaning against the desk next to her and crossing her arms tightly around her torso. "I think 'study' is a loose term," she murmured. "Usually it involves a lot of online shopping and talking about boys."

"You know what I mean," Allison insisted. "We already had plans. How about we just….expand them?"

"To include your ex-boyfriend and my….and, uh, Stiles?" Charlie muttered. "It's not exactly the smoothest of moves, but like I said before…we're not exactly subtle." She blew out a long breath and ran her hands through her hair. "Yeah, what the hell. Let's do that. Maybe the intense awkwardness of that situation will distract from the paralyzing fear. Hell—is there anything we can do to increase said level of awkward?"

"We can meet at my house," Scott murmured.

"Great thinking, Scott!" Charlie said, clapping her hands together with enthusiasm that could have been false or genuine. "That'll definitely do the trick."

He spared her one frustrated glance before continuing. "My mom's on shift tonight. She won't be home."

Charlie let out a sigh and ran her hands through her hair. It was lunchtime now and that meant they only really had three hours of certainty left. Well, three and a half if you counted the one-on-one session with Ms. Morell Lydia's mother had insisted on. Usually those three hours felt like an eternity. She would sit there staring at the clock as the second hand ticked by at an obnoxiously slow rate, taunting her. But suddenly those three hours felt like they would disappear in the space of a breath. And then there was the plan. It wasn't much of a plan. Hell, it was barely even half of a plan. But it was the only plan they had. And as terrible as that plan was, they were going to follow it through to the bitter end.

"Alright then," Charlie murmured, nodding a bit. "Let's get on with it."

Scott nodded as well, moving for the door. Charlie just barely pushed herself off of the desk when all the sudden she heard a whizzing sound followed by a tiny gust of wind that slightly rustled her hair, like something had whizzed through the air right next to her head. Immediately afterwards Scott spun around on his feet, snatching something out of the air as an expression of alarm on his face. Charlie had to blink a couple of times before she realized he was holding what looked like a compact projectile weapon in his hand, mere inches away from his face.

All heads snapped around looking for the source of the weapon. She, Scott, and Allison all found themselves staring into the widened, guilty, and highly sheepish eyes of Stiles. Those eyes darted between the miniature crossbow in his hand and the three of them. "Ah…." he drawled out, a wince etching into his features. "Sorry….."

Rolling her eyes slightly, Charlie wordlessly held out a hand and Stiles shoved the thing into her grasp so quickly you would have thought the thing was on fire. "Sorry," he continued as Charlie passed the crossbow on to Allison. "S—sensitive trigged on that."

Charlie just stared back at him with her eyebrows raised. "This is why we can't have nice things."

After that they staggered their exits. Scott left first. Charlie pushed her way out the door second and strode down the hallway as quickly as possible. She didn't manage to stay alone for very long, though. The slapping of feet against the floor was enough to tell that. Especially at the speed they were going. Nobody ever tried to get anywhere quickly in high school unless they had a reason. And that person would catch up with her in three….two….

"Hey," Allison said, suddenly appearing at Charlie's shoulder.

"Hey," Charlie replied quickly, keeping her eyes forward and her pace brisk.

"So….." Allison drawled out, her eyebrows knitted together in an expression of intense thought. "in there….did I just see what I think I saw."

"That depends," Charlie muttered. "What do you think you saw?"

"Well I think I saw you and Stiles kissing," Allison replied, stealing a sidelong glance in Charlie's direction. "Like, _really_ kissing. Is that what I saw?"

"Yup," Charlie sighed. "That is what you saw."

"You and Stiles," Allison repeated.

"Yup."

"Kissing."

"Yup."

"Kissing?"

"Do you need me to draw you a diagram?" Charlie muttered.

Allison opened her mouth to speak again, but this weird croaking sound was all that came out. It was a few moments before she managed to speak again. "So are you guys like…a couple now?"

"Pretty much, yeah," Charlie snapped, exasperation seeping into her tone.

"You realize that we are going to be talking about this later," Allison said, raising her eyebrows at Charlie pointedly. "We're going to be talking about it a lot. Like so much."

"That's what I was afraid of."

At that point the girls separated, Allison peeling off and turning down a hallway in the direction of her locker. Lunch was almost over, and that meant that the lot of them were going to be forced back into their classrooms. At least Allison's next class was American History, and she would with Lydia. But that really didn't make Charlie feel all that much better. Every second she spent without Lydia standing right in front of her was a second she spent with her stomach tying itself into knots. Hell, she had half a mind to spend her entire free period sitting outside the door to the history room peeking in to make sure that Lydia was okay. There was only one thing stopping her.

They needed more help. Four against four didn't really work out when one side had all the superpowers and the other side had to split up. And that meant that she had to come up with another idea. A terrible idea—an idea that she absolutely hated. An idea that she really wanted to punch in the face.

Squeezing her eyes shut, she gritted her teeth together in determination and turned back down the hallway, going in the direction Scott had headed. By the time she caught up with him, he was standing at his locker, exchanging books with a solemn expression on his face. "Hey, Scott," she called out, making him turn in her direction.

"Hey, Charlie," he replied, frowning in confusion. "I thought we weren't looking for Derek till after classes."

Charlie sighed heavily and came to a stop in front of his locker. "We're not."

"Okay," Scott replied, shrugging in confusion. "Then what's up?"

Charlie bit her lip and folded her arms across her chest nervously. "I think I thought of a way to make it more awkward."

It took Scott a few moments to realize what she was saying, but it wasn't long before realization dawned on his face. He nodded at her in understanding. "What's your idea?"

It took a little longer to find Jackson than Charlie had anticipated. They checked all the usual spots—the courtyard, the lacrosse field, the gym. But, nope. Nowhere to be found. It wasn't till they passed. Plus Scott couldn't seem to catch his scent very easily. Is wasn't until she happened to glance in the window to the library that she saw Jackson there, sitting at a table with Danny who had his laptop open. The two of them seemed to be talking about something pretty serious. Charlie smacked Scott's arm, making him stop, and nodded in Jackson's direction. "There he his."

"Okay," Scott said, making a move to push open the door. "Let's go talk to him."

But before he could reach the handle, Charlie's hand darted forward and snatched at his wrist making him stop. Scott looked down at her with a questioning look, making her wince. "Are we sure this is a good idea?" she whispered.

"Charlie, this was _your_ idea," Scott insisted.

"I know it was my idea," she hissed back. "I'm asking if it's a good one. I've been known to have some pretty shitty ideas."

"Jackson can help us," Scott said, echoing her own words of about fifteen minutes ago. "You're right. He's the only other one who's in on all the werewolf stuff and if anybody's going to be able to stall her, it's Jackson."

Letting out a shaky breath, Charlie ran her hands through her hair and nodded. "I know, I know. It's just that—" she waved her hand in the general direction of her face "—it's just that I hate his face so much. Associating with him voluntarily is something I generally try to avoid."

"But this is for Lydia," Scott reminded.

"Yeah," Charlie said, swallowing heavily and nodding. "It's for Lydia."

It was true. This was for Lydia. And if it meant helping Lydia, Charlie would eat lunch with the guy every freaking day. With one last nod, Scott pushed the door open, allowing Charlie to step through it before walking in himself. The two of them approached the table where Jackson and Danny were seated. As they came to a stop near it, Jackson looked up at them with that typical pissed-off expression of his. Like he hadn't spent the entire morning glaring at them and trying to get as much information out of them as possible. "What do you two idiots want?"

Charlie didn't respond to Jackson's hostile overtures, instead turning to the boy sitting next to him. "Danny—"

"Already out of here," Danny said, throwing some books in a bag before turning back to Jackson. "I'll be back in a bit. The video is still rendering. Just don't touch the computer till I get back."

Jackson looked up at him, his face serious. "Remember not to—"

"I won't watch it," Danny said, finishing the thought. "Seriously, man, where's the trust?"

Danny slowly got to his feet, slinging his bag over his shoulder. Scott and Charlie both smiled widely at him as he passed by. "How's it going?" Charlie murmured, giving him a weird wave. Danny just paused for a moment and shook his head at her.

"Don't do that."

"Okay then."

Danny walked past them, and as soon as he was out of range, Charlie and Scott both sat down opposite Jackson. "What video is he talking about?" Charlie asked as she collapsed into her seat. "You auditioning for a reality TV show? America's Next Top Douche?"

"None of your freaking business," Jackson snapped. "Why are you here?"

Charlie and Scott exchanged a look before continuing. "Lydia," Charlie said simply.

Jackson exhaled sharply and gave a casual shrug of his shoulders. "What about her? Her little freak out in econ is not my problem."

"Oh, come on," Charlie said with a roll of her eyes. "You know this isn't just about what she wrote on the board. You were in chemistry class. You know what happened."

Jackson just made a face and jerked his head to the side noncommittally. "What happened?"

"The paralytic goop?" Charlie prompted. "That stuff that left you lying on the floor? It didn't work on her."

"And I care about this why exactly?" Jackson sighed, looking between them with an expression of complete and total loathing.

"That was the test," Scott insisted. "The kanima? Derek thinks it's her now."

"Again," Jackson drawled out. "So what?"

"So they're going to kill her, you unbearably dense ass-hat," Charlie snapped. "That's the punchline to this little misadventure. They want to kill her."

For a moment there was a break in that cool demeanor. His jaw tightened and his eye twitched slightly. He inhaled sharply before shaking his head at her. "What am I supposed to do about it?" he said, shrugging a bit.

Scott leaned forwards over the table a bit, fixing Jackson with an imploring stare. "You're supposed to help us."

"And how exactly do you two morons propose that we do that, hm?" he said, narrowing his eyes at the both of them. "In case you don't remember, Derek and his little pack all have super-strength. You guys have….." He cocked his head to the side and looked at them with a derisive expression. "You know what, I can't think of anything you have working for you. Why would I sign up for that?"

"Because she would do the same thing for you," Charlie snapped. "Because for some bizarre reason she still has feelings for you. And because if she dies, you will lose one of the two people who actually care about you. If you can actually let something like that happen and not try and stop it, well then….then you're even more hopeless than I thought you were."

Jackson's jaw clenched again. Usually when called him a heartless dickhead, he would just smile and call her an uppity bitch. That was their thing—the casual tossing of insults. They always meant them, but neither of them ever really cared. Mostly because neither of them gave a crap about the other's opinion. But this time….this time Jackson did seem to care. Maybe his heart wasn't a shriveled a husk as she thought it was.

"We need as much help as we can get," Scott implored. "Please."

Jackson reached up a hand to scratch at the back of his neck before speaking. "Well if all she has is you losers then she's a goner. So what the hell kind of idiotic plan did you guys come up with? What do we do?"

"Find Allison and Stiles after school," Scott replied. "Make sure Lydia goes with them and keep her away from Derek."

"Fine," Jackson snapped. "Now can the two of you get out of my face? I've got stuff to do." The two of them began to get out of their seats, but before they were fully out of their chairs, Jackson pointed harshly at the both of them, reverting back to his usual hostile behavior. "I am not dying for any of you morons, so if you do something stupid, do it far away from me."

Wordlessly, Charlie and Scott pushed their way out of their chairs and made their way out of the library. Charlie afforded one last glance over her shoulder in Jackson's direction. He was sitting back in his chair, a dark expression on his face. She almost felt bad for coming at him like that. Almost.

"That was kind of harsh," Scott murmured as they pushed their way back out of the library.

Charlie sighed and ran a hand through her hair, glancing up at Scott slightly guiltily. "When it comes to Lydia I play to win, even if it means playing dirty. Derek's about to figure that out."

Charlie divided the rest of the day into increments of five minutes. The idea of waiting three full hours to actually be able to _do_ something was pretty much unbearable. All she could do was agonize and wallow. But five minutes? That much almost seemed possible. So for five minutes she would wait, she would take notes, she would watch the clock. And then the process would start all over again. Thirty-six times.

And then the thirty-sixth five minute interval ended and the school bell rang. Somehow, even with how carefully she had been watching the clock, that shrill ring managed to surprise her. Charlie jumped in her seat, knocking her books on the floor in the process. Nobody seemed to notice, though. They were all too busy trying to get the hell out of the classroom.

It was the moment of truth—she was going to meet Scott by the locker room and find Derek. As she wound through the hallways, she dug into her phone and dialed Allison's number before pressing the phone up to her ear. It only took about half a ring before Allison picked up. "_Hey, Charlie_," Allison murmured into the phone. "_What's going on—what happened? Did you find Derek yet?_"

"No—not yet," Charlie whispered back. "I was just calling to see if you figured out anything about the kanima. Anything that could help us."

"_I talked to Ms. Morell,_" Allison replied. "_She translated some of the passage._"

"What did she say?" Charlie demanded, glancing around to make sure that there was nobody else listening in on her conversation. Between Grandpa Argent and Derek's pack, she was beginning to get a little paranoid. And by 'a little', she meant 'very'.

"_I don't think it'll help much but….She said the kanima was like werewolves, but it's not looking for a pack. It—it 'seeks a friend' or something._"

"But it's like a werewolf," Charlie elaborated. "Like it should have some of the same powers—increase speed, strength, healing? That sort of stuff?"

"_I—I guess so_," Allison muttered. "_Why?_"

"Just a thought," Charlie replied. Her mind was flying at a thousand miles a minute, trying to come up with something—anything that she could say to Derek to convince him. Any tiny little detail that she could throw in his face to make him think a little harder about what he was doing and what it could mean. It was only when she heard Allison say her name on the other end of the line that she could snap herself out of it. "How's Lydia?"

"_Stiles is with her now_," Allison said. "_I'm meeting them in the library. From there we're bringing her to Scott's. Jackson's here._"

"Good," Charlie muttered. "Make sure he's not too much of a pain in the ass." She rounded the corner of the hallway approaching the locker rooms. She saw Scott standing outside and nodded at him before making her approach. "Hey, Allison I gotta go. I'll call you after it's over."

"_Good luck._"

"Same to you. Keep her safe."

With that she hung up the phone and strode towards Scott. "Okay," she said as she came up to him. "How do we do this?"

Scott sighed and gripped the straps of his backpack tightly. "He's been around the school today. We're going to track him by scent."

"Ugh, there are moments that I feel really sorry for you, dude," she murmured, shaking her head. "I don't even want to know what Derek smells like. Does he smell smug? I bet he smells smug."

Scott gave her a weird look. "What would smug smell like?"

"Like an annoyingly broody, murder-y asshole," Charlie replied.

He let out a light snort and gave her one big pat on the back. "Then yeah," Scott agreed. "Derek definitely smells smug."

Derek was definitely somewhere near campus—he was too careful to leave all of this up to a couple of teenage betas—but her obviously wouldn't be wandering around the hallways of the high school. That move had been weird enough before he went and made himself a person of interest in a ton of murders. So Charlie and Scott started their search outside.

"Okay," Charlie murmured. "Where do we start?"

"I saw Derek outside the window during chemistry class," Scott replied. "We start there and then move forward. He's got to be somewhere close by."

The two of them made their way to the spot where Scott had spotted Derek and then moved on from there. Charlie was pretty sure she would never get used to the image of grown men sniffing the air, but she couldn't argue with the results. Even though those results sometimes took a while to manifest. After doing a full lap around the school with Scott sniffing the air and making this weird expression like he was trying to find out who farted, they ended up on the lacrosse field. Once they were there it was easy enough to spot the person waiting for them—the person was a freaking giant.

"That's not Derek," Charlie said, glancing at Scott.

"I can see that, Charlie," Scott muttered. "But he's the closest thing we have right now."

Boyd was standing in the middle of the field staring at the two of them. Charlie couldn't help but wonder how long he had been standing there. It didn't exactly feel like an efficient use of time. But then again Derek had been known to put style points above practicality. Especially since he became the alpha.

"We want to talk to Derek," Scott called out as they approached him.

"Talk to me," Boyd replied easily.

"Not really interested," Charlie called out, shrugging her shoulders theatrically. "You're not exactly the best conversationalist. Then again, neither is Derek, but that's really not the issue here. Where the hell is he?"

Boyd didn't respond. Instead he stepped out of his spot, circling around the two of them like a predator considering whether or not he should go on the attack. "I don't want to fight you," Scott shouted.

"That's good," Boyd replied. "Because I'm twice the size of you." He stopped the circling, finally allowing Charlie and Scott to approach him. As they did Charlie could see the smirk on Boyd's face, making her hand instinctively clench into a fist as the desire to punch it right off filled her.

"True," Scott admitted. Each step they took towards Boyd, he seemed to get a little bit taller and they seemed to get a little bit shorter. By the time they were face to face, Boyd was looming over them. Scott swallowed heavily as he had to raise his head to maintain eye contact. "Really…really true. But you know what I think?"

Boyd just inclined his head and raised his eyebrows, silently challenging Scott. But Scott just stared back evenly.

"I'm twice as fast."

It all happened in the space of a second. Boyd swung his arm out, no doubt aiming for Scott's face, but Scott managed to dodge it easily, throwing himself forward and colliding with Boyd's middle. Before she knew it they were rolling around on the ground like a couple of kindergartners. Well, not quite like kindergartners, but the frustration was building up in her. "Jesus Christ!" she shouted, kicking absently in the direction of the writhing bodies. "Do you guys want me to go to Coach's office and bring back a ruler? Seriously, why don't you just whip 'em out and measure them right now? It would save us all a lot of time."

Scott and Boyd scrambled up to their feet, but were still glowering at each other, like they were ready throw down all over again. Charlie clenched her hands into fists. She didn't even bother trying to hold in the screams. She just leaned her head back and shouted to the skies. "DEREK!" she screeched, her voice echoing against the wall of trees bordering the lacrosse field. "Derek, you get your broody, arrogant, egotistical, constipated, sour-faced—"

"You can stop describing me now," a voice said from somewhere to her left.

Charlie's head snapped around and she found herself looking at Derek. He was standing there with his arms crossed across his chest, staring at her evenly. That fist her hand had clenched into tightened even further. It was almost like she was on autopilot, the way her fist move. It didn't require any thought or intent. It just swung through the air until it connected with the side of Derek's face.

Almost immediately, a searing pain radiated through Charlie's knuckles and into her arm. Derek on the other hand didn't seem to have been all that affected at all. Charlie swore heavily and stumbled back a few feet. "Son of a—why is your face so pointy?!"

Derek didn't answer her question. Not that she expected him to. And not that she actually cared about the answer. He didn't even seem that affected by the punch, simply turning his head to look at her. "I know why you're here," he said in a voice that almost sounded regretful.

"Of course you know why we're here," Charlie growled, rubbing at her hand to try to mediate the pain. "You're the reason we're here."

"She failed the test," Derek said simply.

"Correction," Charlie spat, turning to face him with fire in her eyes. "She failed _your_test."

"It doesn't prove anything," Scott piled on. "Lydia's different."

"I know," Derek shot back, tension filling his voice. "At night she turns into a homicidal walking snake!"

"We're not going to let you kill her," Scott growled.

And then this—this superior look flitted across Derek's face. Almost like he was pleased with himself—like he had outsmarted them. He cocked his head to the side a bit as he looked at Scott and Charlie. "Well who said I was going to do it?"

And that's when it hit her. Half of this pack was missing. It had never occurred to her that Derek would outsource something as brutal as killing a person. She thought that she understood Derek—that he had had some sort of code to operate under—but it was becoming abundantly clear that she didn't know him at all. He might be the alpha now, but power did not look good on him. She and Scott exchanged a glance and it was clear he had realized the same thing she had. Only where he went to hurl himself in the direction of the school, Charlie subtly took out her phone.

_Isaac and Erica after Lydia. Get her out._

About the same time Charlie managed to hit send on that text to Stiles and Allison, Boyd was throwing himself at Scott, knocking him to the ground. Charlie gave a sympathetic wince, but stayed rooted in place. Derek must have felt her eyes on him, trying their best to burn a hole in his skin because he looked in her direction, but only for a moment. "I don't know why you think you have to protect everyone," he said, glancing between her and Scott. "But even so, Lydia has killed people and she's gonna do it again. And next time it's gonna be one of us."

"It's not her!" Charlie yelled.

Derek glowered at her. "There were two people it could have been."

"Well then who's the other one?" Charlie spluttered, throwing her hands in the air in frustration.

Derek's gaze darkened visibly as he looked at her. "You."

The word was like a slap in the face, making Charlie physically recoil. "Me?" she demanded harshly. "What the hell do you mean me?"

Derek took a step towards her, and Charlie took an instinctive step back. Derek blinked at her reaction, but otherwise didn't show any of the conventional hallmarks of human emotion. The robot was back. And apparently the robot had considered killing her. "After what Peter did to you with the memory transfer?" Derek said, looking at her matter-of-factly. "After what you told me? Those claws went deep—it could have been you. But you were in the pool, so you get a pass. But Lydia? Process of elimination—that means it's her."

Suddenly, rage shot through Charlie unlike anything she had ever felt before. She wanted to throw herself at Derek—to scratch and claw at him. She contained the urge, but it still lit a fire inside her veins. "Process of elimination?" The words came out as a whisper, but they echoed like a thunderclap. She took a small step towards Derek and her lips pulled back menacingly, almost like she was baring her teeth. "You want to kill my best friend based off process of elimination?"

"She was bitten by an alpha," Derek reasoned. "That means it's her."

"You saw that thing up close," Scott insisted from his spot on the ground. "That thing….it's not like us."

"But it is!" Derek shouted back. "We're all shape-shifters! You don't know what you're dealing with! It happens rarely and it happens for a reason!"

"What reason?" Scott demanded.

"Sometimes the shape you take reflects the kind of person you are." He leaned forward and offered a hand out to Scott, like that tiny gesture was some kind of olive branch. Like it changed anything. Charlie quietly wished for Scott to slap that hand away and get up on his own, but he didn't. He grasped Derek's hand and allowed himself to be pulled to his feet. Derek fixed Scott with a serious look, sending a glance in Charlie's direction as well. "Even Stiles calls her cold-blooded."

"Screw you."

The words left Charlie's mouth without her thinking. Not that she would have held them in if she did have time to think. Derek turned in her direction, his eyebrows raised. Charlie narrowed her eyes at him and folded her arms across her chest. "Lydia's not cold-blooded," she spat angrily. "She's just bored. She's smarter than anybody else any of us will ever meet, and you expect her to be all touchy feely? What if you were thrown in a room with people and you were infinitely smarter than them? Nobody can keep up with you, nobody can understand you—do you think you'd be able to emotionally invest in any of them? No. Lydia's not cold. She just has fewer people she can really care about. You're just too stupid to know the difference."

"That's touching," Derek replied, still wearing that deadpan, hostile expression that didn't look touched at all. "But it doesn't change anything."

"She's a shape-shifter, right?" Charlie said, throwing her hands in the air. "Shape-shifters have powers when they're not shifting. Hearing, sight, smelling, healing, all sorts of perks, right? Why doesn't Lydia have any of that? Why does she still have a scar from where Peter bit her? You're killing an innocent person!"

"No, I'm not! She didn't pass the test!

Scott moved next to her so that the two of them were standing shoulder-to-shoulder. "What if Lydia's immune?" Scott demanded. "What if she's got something inside of her that makes her immune to the bite? Which is why she didn't get paralyzed!"

Derek's face contorted into a derisive expression, but there was a shadow behind the eyes—a flicker of doubt. Like there was something he was hiding. "Noone's immune!" he exclaimed. "I've never seen it or heard of it! It's—it's never happened!" "

"What about Jackson?"

As soon as the words left Scott's mouth, Derek's face pinched into a sour expression. This was it—the question he was hoping to avoid. The one he was hoping neither of them would think to ask.

"Come on, Derek," she said, leaning in a bit, her voice taunting him. Charlie let out a bitter laugh and shook her head at him. "You lied to us earlier—you said there were two options," she continued. "Me and Lydia. If that's true, then why the hell would you have to check Jackson? If the bite of an alpha is what it takes to make this thing, then why would you test him?"

"It's because you gave him what you wanted, didn't you?" Scott piled on. At that point Derek had to look away, breaking eye contact with the both of them. Charlie was an accomplished enough liar at this point to be able to recognize the tells. Derek didn't have an answer for them. He couldn't bullshit himself out of this corner.

"Scott—"

"Peter said the bite either kills you or it turns you!" Scott said, his voice rising until he was shouting. "You—you were probably hoping that he would die! But nothing happened, right? And you have no idea why."

Derek's gaze increased in intensity as he stared at Scott. He pressed his lips together in a thin, reluctant line and exhaled sharply. Almost like it was painful for him to admit he was wrong. "No," he finally said.

All of the sudden, Scott's tone became softer again—more imploring. "I have a theory," Scott said urgently. "Lydia's immune and somehow she passed it on to Jackson. You know I'm right!"

"No!"

"You're a coward," Charlie hissed. Derek's hard gaze shifted to her. It was so harsh, it almost felt like it burned her skin, but she squared her shoulders in his direction, giving as good as she got. She jutted her chin forward, looking at him defiantly. "You're a fucking hypocrite. You know as much about this stuff as we do—you're making it up as you go along. You _want_ it to be Lydia. Because if it's Lydia, then that means that this whole thing is Peter's fault. You get to be the one who fixes it, but here you are—" she spread her arms out wide, gesturing at the lacrosse field around her"—here you are going after a helpless girl. Just like he did. Maybe there is a little bit of a Hale family resemblance."

Derek physically twitched at her words. It wasn't pronounced or violent, but it was there, and getting Derek to actually react to something wasn't easy. That was enough to let Charlie know that she had chosen the right button to push. Was it cruel? Yes. Was it fair? Maybe not. But she didn't really care anymore. She just wanted to hurt him. And if she couldn't do it with her fists, she was going to do it with her words. All of the sudden she felt a hand on her shoulder, tugging her back. It wasn't until then she even realized she had advanced on him to the point where she was practically spitting in his face. Scott pulled her back until she was in line with him, but Charlie never stopped glaring at Derek. Not for a second.

It only took a few seconds for Derek to reset to his default setting. Angry.

"I can't let her live!" he shouted, glaring at the both of them. "You should have known that!"

The words rang in her ears, and wouldn't leave her. They echoed over and over, blocking everything else out, like somebody had smashed a pair of cymbals right next to her head. The air rushed out of her lungs, making her shoulders sag forwards, and her eyes fell shut. But while her body seemed to be shrinking, her determination grew. When she tilted her head back up again, her jaw was set. "We're done." She raised her hands in the air and began backing away from him, back towards the school. "I'm done with you."

Derek watched her as she backed away, and even after she turned around she could feel his eyes on her as she retreated. But she didn't care. She meant what she said. Derek wasn't a friend anymore. Honestly he had never really been a friend in the first place. Hell, he wasn't even an ally. Not really. What was it that she had said all those months ago? As long as they had the same interests, they were square. Now, as far as she was concerned, the two of them had nothing.

Charlie checked her phone as she half-walked, half-ran to parking lot. She had messages from Stiles and Allison, both of them telling her that they had managed to get Lydia out of the school and to Scott's house. Since Derek was still arguing with Scott, that meant they still had some time. Not a lot, but some. Tossing her phone back in her bag, she grabbed her keys instead, dodging between the cars of the parking lot until she found her way to her own. She quickly unlocked it, slid into the driver's seat, and shoved her keys into the ignition. But this time when she turned the key, she didn't hear that faithful roar of the engine. The only thing that reached her ears was a pathetic spluttering. That sound was like a knife in her gut.

"No," she whispered to herself. "No, no, no, no, no. Not now, girl—you can't do this to me now!"

But no matter how many times she turned to key, all she got was a dull squealing noise. It felt like an invisible hand closed around her throat at the panic began to rise. She sucked in frantic breaths until she was bordering on hyperventilation until something made her stop. A shiny black Camaro drove by her, four people inside—Derek's pack. As it did, the passenger's side window rolled down to reveal a smirking Erica. With those painted red lips, she blew Charlie a kiss before sliding on a pair of sunglasses and rolling the window back up.

She couldn't…..She wouldn't….Oh, who the hell was Charlie kidding? Of course Erica would. She did not respect the wheels.

Swearing loudly, Charlie threw herself out of the car and sprinted around to the front. She grabbed the hood, lifting it up to get a better look at the engine inside. There, at the center of the mechanics of the thing, was a gaping hole where the battery should be. Next to it was a note that she was pretty sure had been scrawled out in lipstick.

_Lose something?_

Charlie stared after the Camaro silently, almost like she was in shock. She wanted to yell, scream, shout, but there were too many words flying through her mind. None of them stayed still long enough to find their way to her tongue. Until one did.

"Bitch."

Charlie drove her hands into her hair and pulled slightly, squeezing her eyes shut. She needed a way to get to Scott's house fast, and that meant she had to force her brain to slow down enough for her to think. And so she did what her dad had taught her to do when she was panicking. Count down from ten.

"Ten…nine…eight…."

When she got down to one her breathing was less rapid and her pulse was closer to normal. Finally, she opened her eyes, and when she did the solution presented itself. Kind of. She was staring at the bike rack.

Petty theft. That was how she was going to get to Lydia. Was it ideal? No. Was it ethical? Not in the least. Could she get into an obscene amount of trouble? Most definitely. Did she care about any of the reasons she just listed? Fuck no. Plus, she had probably already done a ton of other crap that was way more illegal than 'temporarily misappropriating' someone's bike.

Reaching into her messenger bag, she pulled out two things—her phone and a Bobby pin. She had started keeping Bobby pins in the bottom of her bag lest she need to break into something. Yup, that was her life now. She had to allow for the possibility that she would need to break into something. She quickly dialed Stiles's phone number and propped the phone up to her ear using her shoulder while her hands went to work on the Bobby pin, snapping it in half as she began to mold it into the appropriate shape. It only took about half a ring before she heard the loud click that signified somebody picking up. Stiles's slightly staticky voice echoed from the receiver.

"_Charlie—_"

"Derek's on his way over to you guys with the rest of the pack," Charlie interrupted. "They don't know where you are, but with Derek tracking by scent they're going to be there soon."

Stiles swore loudly, which was followed by a loud thumping noise—probably him kicking at something. "_You and Scott had better get here soon, then_," he muttered into the receiver. "_Scott's house isn't exactly a fortress, and I don't think propping a chair under the door handle is really going to slow them down all that much. Allison doesn't have an unlimited supply of mini-arrows. Her purse isn't that big._"

"Does Scott's mom have a bar?" Charlie asked.

A bitter laugh echoed from the other end of the call. "_As awesome as a drink sounds, I don't think this is the right time._"

"Molotov cocktails, Stiles," Charlie informed him. "Smash and then fire, remember?"

"_Right_," Stiles replied through what sounded like gritted teeth. "_Shock and awe. Got it. Scott's mom—she doesn't really drink. Maybe some wine but—look when are you guys getting here?_"

"I don't know about Scott," Charlie informed him. "He was still talking to Derek when I left, but I'm going to be a while."

"_What?!_"

"Erica disabled my car. Ripped the battery clean out."

"_Son of a—!"_ What followed was a rant using some of the more colorful curses Charlie had heard in recent history, followed by a few incoherent sentences about property rights._ "Charlie…we kinda need reinforcements here._"

"I know," Charlie said, marching in the direction of the bicycle rack. "I'm working on it. I think I found an alternative means of transportation, but it's still going to take a little longer."

"_How much longer?_"

Charlie blew out a long breath and came to a stop in front of the bike rack, staring down at all of her potential victims. She squatted down and looked down the line of them, trying to find the one with the easiest lock. "Like six months of community service," she mumbled into the receiver.

"_What?_"

"I'll get there as soon as I can, Stiles," she murmured. "Call Scott."

A tense silence filled the airwaves for a few moments before Stiles spoke again. "_Charlie…just—just be careful, okay._"

Charlie let out a light snort and a small smile tugged at the corner of her lips. "You know me, Stiles. I'm always careful."

Letting the phone slip from where her chin was propping it up, Charlie caught it easily and hit the 'end' key before stowing it back in her back pocket. She bit her lip and continued to consider her options until her eyes fell on the perfect candidate. It was a green bike about three places down from her with a little novelty plate that spelled out the name in all caps. A name that belonged to someone currently sitting in detention with Coach Finstock for quote, 'having an irritating face and forgetting to turn in a full week of assignments'.

GREENBURG.

Staying low to the ground, Charlie shuffled over a few feet until she was right next to the bike. She glanced left and right, checking over her shoulder for anybody that might be suspicious of her. But, as per usual, the burning desire all high school students have to be anywhere other than high school kept their eyes pretty much fixed on their cars or buses or whatever the hell was their method of transportation out of the hellhole. Biting her lip in concentration, Charlie hooked the bent edges of the Bobby pin into the black U-lock keeping the bike latched to the rack. It took a few moments of jimmying before the lock clicked open. Charlie quickly shoved the lock into her bag before jumping to her feet and wrenching the bike out of its spot and hopping on.

Adrenaline could be a funny thing. It was a strangely emotional hormone. If the trigger is right, it could give you strength that almost seemed super-human, like that story where the mom lifts a car to save her kid trapped underneath. Charlie definitely wasn't lifting any cars, but adrenaline did do one thing for her. It made her pedal faster than she ever thought she could. She was just worried that that still wouldn't be fast enough.

She kept seeing it in her head, over and over again. That night. The night she had been forced to relive this morning. Seeing Lydia there, pale and bleeding on the ground. She couldn't do it again. She couldn't watch the life leak out of her again. So she pedaled faster.

Charlie took a shortcut to Scott's house, bumping along one of those dirt roads that cut through the woods. The wind whipped at her hair as she whizzed through the forest. Slowly, the light that managed to creep in through the leaves of the trees got dimmer and dimmer, until there barely enough to see by. It almost seemed as if there wasn't even a sunset, just a gradual fade to black, like someone had superimposed one of those depressing instagram filters on her life. By the time she finally broke the line of the trees, it was already completely dark.

Once Charlie careened back onto the paved roads, she wasn't that far from Scott's house. The woods seemed to connect pretty much everything in Beacon Hills. When she had gotten about a block away from Scott's place, she slammed on the breaks and skidded to a halt, almost falling off the bike in the process. As much as she would love to ride that bike straight to Scott's house, in the front door, and only stop when she was in the middle of the freaking living room, that wasn't exactly a practical move. There was no way Derek and his pack hadn't found their way to Scott's house yet. She needed a more subtle approach.

At first when she saw Scott's house, everything seemed normal. It was just your average house on your average street in suburbia. But as Charlie crept closer, she began to notice that everything was off. Your average house usually didn't leave the door wide open in the middle of the night. She squinted through the dark and saw shadows flying around inside while two stoic figures stood on the curb opposite the house. They would see her if she tried to approach through the front.

Biting back her rage, Charlie crept around the side of the building, looking for a point of entry. She needed the element of surprise. It as pretty much the only thing you could have going for you when going against a couple of werewolves. She spotted a second floor window that was wide open, the trellis underneath giving her a good way to hoist herself up. Staying low to the ground to avoid detection, she darted across the street before hoisting herself up.

All of the sudden she heard Allison's voice echo from the room above. "Stiles! It's here!"

"Allison?" Charlie hissed.

"Charlie?"

The sound of footsteps echoed above her and Allison's face appeared at the window. "Charlie—stop!" Allison whispered harshly, lifting up a hand. Immediately Charlie halted her climb and looked up at Allison, a question in her eyes. Allison gestured over at a thick, gelatinous substance that was dripping from the window. "Don't—don't touch that, okay? You can't touch that. The kanima is here."

Charlie swore loudly and Allison leaned forwards, opening up the window a little bit more. Charlie clambered upwards a little further and Allison hooked a hand under her shoulder, helping her through as she avoided the kanima goop. Hauling herself into the room, she tumbled onto the floor and did a little bit of a backflip before hopping up to her feet. "Where's Lydia?" Charlie demanded.

"Locked in the bathroom," Allison whispered. Just then there was a loud crash emanating from downstairs, making Allison run the hand not holding a compact crossbow through her hair, anxiety written into every line of her face. "We can't do this. We can't hold them off for much longer."

"What about Scott?" Charlie murmured.

"He's still not here."

"How the hell is he still not here?!"

"He got held up with something at school. He's on his way, but I'm not sure when he'll get here." Allison let out a groan of frustration and began to pace back and forth. "How are we supposed to do this? We can't fight them! There are too many of them, and they're too strong. I think—I think I'm going to have to call my dad.

Charlie blanched at the idea. She found Mr. Argent moderately terrifying under normal circumstances. Him finding out that Allison was still sneaking around with 'werewolf ex-boyfriend & friends'? That was not a conversation that Charlie ever wanted to witness. "I don't think we should call your dad," she whispered.

"Then what?" Allison demanded. "Other than him…..I—I just started training. I can't…..The only things that can fight them are the ones like them."

As soon as the words left Allison's lips, something snapped into place. An idea. A good idea. Charlie looked up at Allison, only to find that the other girl was looking at her with that same expression of realization. The two of them slowly turned in the direction of the window. That disgusting supernatural mucus was still dripping form the window frame. When the girls looked at each other again, they were both wearing tiny smiles.

The idea occurred to them not a moment too soon. Almost that instant they heard a banging at the door, trying to force it open. Allison darted over to the window and took one of those dart things, carefully covering it with the kanima venom. By the time the door was down, Allison's arm was lifted again, pointing at the intruder.

Once the door swung open, Erica stepped through, that superior smirk still painted across her face, scoffing at Allison's weapon. She folded her arms across her chest and let out a casual sigh. "This might make me sound like kind of a bitch, but I've always wondered what it would feel like to steal somebody's boyfriend."

"You're right," Charlie spat back. "That does make you sound like a bitch."

Erica just shrugged, taking a step towards the two other girls. "I'll bet it's a really sick rush of power. I think I might try it on Scott. And you know what, I don't think it's going to be that hard. Because why would he be waiting around for ten minutes with you when he can have me any time he wants?"

Then she shifted on her feet a bit, turning to Charlie. She licked her red lips in an oddly menacing way before smiling at her. "Or maybe I should just go after Stiles. I pretty sure I can come up with a couple of ways to make him forget all about a certain redhead. And anyways, you know what they say. Gentlemen prefer blondes."

Charlie had hated very few people over the course of her lifetime. She would like to say that it was because she was all enlightened—that you had to 'walk a mile in the other's shoes' and all that emotional crap—but really it was because she thought it was just a giant waste of time and energy. It was because she didn't care about the other person or their opinion enough to bother hating them. They were an inconvenience—some pain in the ass thing she had to put up with every so often. But Erica….pretty soon Charlie was going to have to start actively hating her.

"If you don't shoot her," Charlie growled through gritted teeth, "I will."

It didn't take any more prompting for Allison to let the arrow fly. As predicted, Erica snatched it out of the air with almost impossible ease. She let out this superior laugh—no, it was more of a cackle—and sneered at the pair of them. "You didn't really think that would work, did you?"

"Actually I did," Allison replied. It wasn't till Allison smiled that Erica seemed to think that there was anything wrong at all. Finally the girl opened her hand, revealing the mess of sticky liquid. After one violent convulsion, Erica collapsed. And honestly? The sound of her hitting the ground was music to Charlie's ears. Letting out a casual sigh, Charlie swung her head to the side to look at Allison. "You cool to take out the trash?" she asked, jerking her head in the direction of Erica's crumpled form.

"Yeah," Allison mused, never taking her eyes off of Erica. "Yeah, I got this."

"Great," Charlie sighed. "I'll take care of the mess downstairs."

After patting Allison lightly on the shoulder, Charlie reached into her bag and pulled out that number 2 pencil before striding over to the window. She dipped the pencil in the kanima venom, grimacing at it liquid as it slowly dripped onto the floor. Holding it far out in front of her, she jogged down the stairs. The loud crashes and sounds of breaking glass told her where to go. Charlie sprinted through the house, still holding the pencil out in front of her like it was diseased. When she rounded the corner into the kitchen, she saw Stiles on the ground as Isaac loomed over him, scrambling to get away. Isaac made a move to grab at his feet, yanking him backwards.

"HEY!"

The sound of Charlie's voice made Isaac wheel around, but she didn't give him the chance to say anything to her. She just swung her arm out, jamming that pencil as far into his arm as she could. It somehow managed to rip through the leather of his jacket and pierce his skin. The force of the impact sent her stumbling backwards, away from him. Isaac didn't even react all that much. He just looked at the pencil sticking out of his arm and then back at her again, his eyebrows raised skeptically. "Really?"

"Yeah," Charlie said, her breath still coming out in pants. "Really."

Isaac laughed lightly and reached up, yanking the pencil out of his arm. As soon as he did, though, his hand began to shake. His eyebrows drew together in a confused frown and he looked at her almost accusatorially before toppling over. On his way down, his head collided with the corner of the kitchen table, giving rise to a sickening crack. Charlie winced heavily and the sound, watching as he hit the ground with a thump. Charlie leaned over his figure, squinting down at his face. His eyes were closed and his face blank. She nudged him with the toe of her shoe, but received no response. He was completely unconscious. Exhaling sharply, she glanced over at Stiles who was still on the ground, looking at her with a thoroughly baffled expression. Charlie just made a face and shrugged.

"Whoops."

"Whoops?" Stiles repeated, looking at her pointedly. "Did you seriously just say 'whoops'? How the hell did you do that?!"

"Kanima venom," she replied quickly. "It's here. Which means we still have trouble."

Charlie stepped over Isaac's body and made her way across the room towards Stiles, holding out a hand for him to take. He grasped it and allowed himself to be hauled to his feet so that he was standing right over her, their faces inches apart. "Nice of you to finally show up," he murmured.

"I was fashionably late!" Charlie protested, throwing her hands in the air. "And anyways, you've got to admit that that was a hell of an entrance. I had an incredibly commanding presence back there and—"

Stiles ducked his head down, cutting her off with a swift kiss. It made Charlie stumble backwards a bit in surprise, but his hands gripped her shoulders, keeping her steady. When he drew back, he rested his forehead against hers. She looked up at him, quirking an eyebrow. "What did I tell you about the number 2 pencil?" she asked, smirking at him a bit.

"I will never again question the power of the number 2 pencil," Stiles replied, waving his hands a bit. "The number 2 pencil from here on out will be considered a deadly weapon."

All of the sudden the back door of the house—the one connected to the kitchen—swung open, making both Charlie and Stiles jump in surprise. Charlie felt her body tense, ready to fight or to run—she wasn't quite sure which—but it wasn't Derek or Boyd on the other side of that door. It was Scott. Scott's eyes went wide, looking between them and the body on the floor with those huge puppy dog eyes. "Wh—what happened?"

"You're late," Stiles deadpanned.

"Hey guys!" Allison called out, jogging down the stairs. "Can someone help me move Erica? She's actually pretty heavy."

It took three people and a werewolf, but somehow they managed to haul the limp bodies of Derek's betas to the front door where Scott unceremoniously tossed them at Derek's feet. The four of them filed out onto Scott's porch with Scott in the front, staring at Derek defiantly. And Derek…he looked amused—almost proud. It definitely wasn't the face of somebody who had just gotten their ass kicked, gift wrapped, and then handed back to them. "I think I understand why you keep refusing me, Scott," he called out. "You're not an omega. You're already an alpha. Of your own pack." But then Derek smiled, and it was that superior, knowing smile that made Charlie want to punch him in the face all over again. "But you know you can't beat me," he finished.

"I can hold you off until the cops get here," he replied.

Suddenly Derek's face was replaced by something else—a displeased frown. He cocked his head to the side like he was listening for something. It was then that Charlie heard it. The faint wailing of sirens in the distance. The cops were on their way, and even Derek wasn't bold enough to murder somebody right under the nose of the authorities.

But then Charlie heard something else—something much closer. Walking. Creeping. Slithering. Right above her head.

Immediately she, Stiles, Scott, and Allison all sprinted off the porch, all of them wheeling around to get a look at the source of the noise. And then she saw it. The thing that had never left the corner of her mind since that day at the pool. Scales, translucent claws, fangs. It was crawling along the roof. All of the sudden the creature's head snapped around, staring directly at the lot of them. The force of its gaze made Charlie twitch violently. Then it opened its mouth, letting out a hiss that chilled her to her core before jumping off the roof and scampering off into the night.

Charlie took a moment to glance over at Derek. His jaw was set. She could see it in his face. He was more convinced now than ever that it was Lydia. And he wasn't going to stop. Or at least that's what she thought until she heard the very distinctive sound of high heels against hardwood floors. All of the sudden Lydia appeared in the doorway, tears in her eyes and panic in her voice.

"Will someone please tell me what the hell is going on?!"

In that moment everything became painfully clear. Three potential kanimas. It wasn't Charlie. It wasn't Lydia. All it took was the process of elimination.

Scott's voice cut through the air, ringing in all of their ears.

"It's Jackson."

There were a lot of sayings about knowledge. 'Knowledge is power'. 'The truth will set you free'. And they might all be true, but when it comes to that moment—that point in time when you everything snaps into place, when you figure it all out—well, those sayings all kind of seem like bullshit. Because when you're smacked in the face with cold, hard reality, you don't really get to have that feeling of justification all those sayings promise. All you get is a huge mess.

Charlie gritted her teeth and looked away from the vacant place the kanima used to be and narrowed her eyes at Derek. He must have felt her gaze on him, because his head turned slightly and they locked eyes. "That's right, dick," she whispered, knowing he could hear her. "This one's on you."

**Hey guys! I finally got the time for another chapter. I hope you guys like it. **

**Some of you are probably going to be a little bit angry about how I'm leaving things with Charlie and Derek. As much as I love their scenes, I'm going for realism here. Charlie's not going to forgive him for going after Lydia—not for a while. He has to earn her respect back, and that's something I'm looking forward to writing! They will become friends, though. Kind of brother-sister actually. I have an arc I'm taking them through. It'll be frustrating, but they'll get there!**

**Also, witness the beginning of Charlie and Scott becoming actual friends. They've had more of a 'friend of a friend' status, but they are going to start growing closer now. By season 3 they'll actually be quite close.**

**Please review/comment! I have just had two of the hardest weeks ever. I've been working 14 hour days and it's just generally been crappy and reviews always brighten my day, so please review. Ugh, I sound horribly needy, don't I? Sorry! Hope you enjoyed!**

**Soundtrack**

**Charlie and Stiles have a 'couple moment'.**

**-~-~-~-~-~-~Old Haunts - Memoryhouse**

**Charlie and Scott go off to find Jackson.**

**-~-~-~-~-~-~Bad Luck - Royal City**

**Charlie and Scott walk onto the lacrosse field to confront Derek.**

**-~-~-~-~-~-~Too late, too far - Cant**

**Charlie bikes to Scott's house.**

**-~-~-~-~-~-~Neuromancer - EMA**

**Everybody realizes that Jackson is the kanima.**

**-~-~-~-~-~-~Horse Race - Colourmusic**


	20. Welcome to the Jungle

**Disclaimer: 'Teen Wolf' isn't mine. Shocking, right? But it's true. If there are any similarities in content or dialogue, it has probably originated with the show.**

**A huge thank you to 19irene96, kore12191, Daenerys86, Sonny13, DraxThePacifist, meels234, katiesgotagun, Valkyrie101, topaz shadow, Ayine, PhoenixRage92, Gee Brittany, Red red red ribbon, WinchesterDixonBros, My mother is a koala, Lady Shagging Godiva, Guest, Lissa, brighteyes96, Bai, Devon Laurel, bagginsoftheshire666, CantCatchTomorrow, Atomicity, fighter61998, kickarseanime, ellsosaurus, TheMMMG, resinswhy, zvc56, Female Whovian, aPaperheaRt, AmyRoxx123, Cameron, Any Excuse, Guest, Caliweiser, Exuberance of Youth, shy-lady, KEZZ 1, onethousandmoths, BewareTheBearShark, honjlh, Hbarr, Kelly1432, and NeoMulder for reviewing! You guys are the best.**

**Okay, so here's a new chapter! Finally, right? But it's long, so at least there's that! I've been working crazy hours, but guess what, you guys?! I GOT A PROMOTION! Sure it's still not in the field I want to work in ultimately, but in less than one year of working on films I've made a lot of progress, so yay!**

**I'm really happy with most of this chapter, but I'm afraid the ending might be a little too abstract. **

**Anywho, please forgive grammar errors/stupid mistakes. I'm kinda exhausted.**

Chapter 20 – Welcome to the Jungle

The silence was like a scream.

That's all that Charlie could think about as she sat in the back seat of Allison's car. The quiet. It rang in her ears in a way that felt deafening. It was an indictment, an accusation. The silence left the atmosphere in the car thick, crackling with tension and anxiety. It felt like the air was becoming more dense, filling her lungs until she choked on it. It was the sound of her own guilt.

At first Charlie had been afraid of the questions. She had been afraid of Lydia staring at her expectantly, waiting for answers that she wasn't sure she could give. She thought that that would be the worst feeling in the world. It wasn't. Sitting here, trying to guess Lydia's thoughts—trying to decipher what was going on behind her eyes—that was her hell. Not knowing. From her point in back seat, she kept her eyes trained on Lydia's reflection in the mirror. Her jaw was set and she was staring out the window, refusing to engage with either her or Allison. Charlie couldn't help but think that the reason Lydia wasn't asking any questions was because she already knew that they would lie to her.

But even if Lydia did ask questions, Charlie wasn't sure she could answer them. Those few moments were so bizarre, she wasn't sure she could find the words to explain it to herself. The whole freaking night was just a series of traumatic events, bleeding into each other, the conclusion of it just as chaotic as everything else. Somehow, in the space of a few seconds, the threat she had been fighting against all day just melted away, leaving Charlie with the wreckage. As the blinking lights and sirens approached, Derek and his pack seemed to melt away. Derek took off after the kanima—after Jackson—disappearing into the night and leaving Boyd to haul his two fellow betas into the Camero.

The next to leave were Stiles and Scott. After a few severely uncoordinated excuses—just enough to convince the cops that had showed up that everything had been a false alarm—they hopped into the Jeep and sped off into the night as well. Then it was just the three of them—Charlie, Lydia, and Allison—standing on the porch in a state of shock. Then Lydia looked between the two other girls, a hurt, confusion, and anger all equally present in her eyes.

"Take me home. Now."

And now here they were, entombed in a metal box of fear and resentment. Charlie could feel it rolling off Lydia in waves. Every small lie, every excuse, every avoidance was adding up to this moment. At least Charlie had the benefit of plausible deniability. Lydia hadn't seen her there until the last second. As far as Lydia _knew_, she was just as in the dark about everything that had happened at Scott's. Allison was the one carrying the burden of the explanation. But what Lydia knew for sure and what Lydia suspected were two very different things. And Charlie got the feeling that Lydia had been suspecting her for a while now.

More than anything Charlie just wanted to scream the truth, every little agonizing detail of it, and be done with it. She wanted to so badly her chest ached, like the words were physically trying to rip their way out of her lungs. But she as much as she felt those words trying to get out of her, she still didn't know what they were. How could you tell someone their ex-boyfriend is a homicidal lizard monster and they were just saved from a pack of werewolves without sounding like a complete lunatic? Charlie pulled her knees up to her chest, wrapping her arms around them. When she glanced back up at the rearview mirror to get another look at Lydia, her eyes connected with Allison's instead. They seemed to be looking at her with warning.

Finally, Allison's car pulled up in the Martin's driveway. Allison shut off the engine, taking a deep breath before turning to face Lydia. "I need you to promise that you won't say anything about what just happened," she whispered.

Charlie could see Lydia's jaw twitching as she considered the request. "I'll promise not to say anything about what happened," she bit out. "If you can tell me….what the _hell_ just happened?" She spun around in her seat, eyeing up Charlie next. "Seriously, Charlie, don't you have anything to add here?! Because I am still freaking the hell out!"

The question was more of an accusation than anything else. It was like Lydia was daring her to say that she had no idea what was going on—daring her to lie. Again. Charlie just ended up opening and closing her mouth wordlessly, giving off a confused croaking noise. Lydia let out a bitter scoff, narrowing her eyes at Charlie before turning back to Allison, her eyebrows raised expectantly.

"I—it's kind of complicated," Allison stammered out.

Lydia rolled her eyes and exhaled sharply. "Well let's start with….why was Derek there? Or—or where Jackson went or what is wrong with Erica?!" Allison exhaled sharply and bowed her head, making Lydia scoff angrily. "What?!" she demanded. "Do you need time to come up with a plausible lie?"

Again, Lydia spun around in her chair, raising her eyebrows at Charlie. "H—how can you not have any questions about this?" Charlie kept her mouth clamped shut, not trusting what she would say if she opened it. But she never didn't have anything to say. She was digging her own grave with her silence. Her lower lip trembled slightly, making Charlie's heart seize up in her chest. "Nothing?" she demanded, hysteria edging into her voice. "You've really got nothing to say to me? You just show up outside Scott's house and find Derek and a bunch of cops, and you don't find anything suspicious about that? There's nothing you want elaborated on or explained? Or do you just not have any questions because you already know exactly what's going on?"

"Lydia, I—"

"You know what?!" Lydia said, her voice becoming more and more high-pitched. "Don't even bother. I am so sick of listening to you guys come up with ways to not tell me things! All of you! I don't know what you're all hiding, but—"

But before Lydia could continue on her rant, Allison interrupted her. "Part of the reason why I'm asking is because….Scott and I aren't supposed to be seeing each other, okay?" she said, looking at Lydia pointedly. "So it's better if you just keep what you know to yourself."

"Fine," Lydia snapped. "I'll keep what I know about you and your boyfriend…..which is nothing…to myself. And Charlie, how about you give me a call when you decide to actually tell me the truth. Or talk to me about anything actually _real_ that's happening in your life."

Lydia made a move to get out of the car, but before she could Allison's hand darted forwards, grabbing hold of her arm. Immediately Lydia went rigid, all of her muscles tensing up all at once. Her head snapped around and she looked at Allison, her eyes narrowed dangerously. "Let me go."

"Just for one second, please try and remember."

"Remember what?!" Lydia screeched.

"Remember what it feels like!" Allison pleaded earnestly. "All of those times in school when you see him standing down the hall and you can't breathe until you're with him. Or all those times in class when you can't stop looking at the clock because you know he's standing out there, waiting for you! Don't you remember what that's like?"

Charlie felt herself sink in her seat, a hollow feeling building in her chest. That feeling Allison was talking about? She wasn't sure if she had felt it. Maybe sometimes. There were times she would think about Stiles and her heart would beat a little faster. There were times she would imagine that goofy grin he got on his face whenever he talked about Star Wars, or that pinched, frustrated look he got when she was kicking his ass at Halo. And when she imagined those things, she wanted nothing more than for him to be sitting next to her. But what Allison was describing? She wasn't sure she could do that. She wasn't sure she could fully give herself over to another person like that. She might want to, but she just wasn't built that way. And what did that make her?

"No," Lydia whispered, that one word breaking through Charlie's thoughts.

"What are you talking about?" Allison demanded, looking at Lydia through wide eyes. "You've had boyfriends before!"

Lydia's jaw twitched anxiously and she shook her head. "Not like that," she replied, her voice hoarse.

This time when Lydia reached for the door handle, Allison didn't try and stop her. The readhead just grabbed her bag and climbed out of the car, walking towards her front door with stiff, abrupt movements. Charlie stayed low in her seat, watching Lydia go. And she felt like herself going colder with every step. It felt like a chasm was opening up between the two of them—a tectonic shift in their friendship. Lydia just kept feeling further and further away.

All of the sudden Charlie heard a grunt of frustration from the front seat. Allison slammed a fist against the steering wheel before turning around to face Charlie. "Thanks for all your help back there," Allison muttered slightly bitterly.

Honestly Charlie understood why Allison was a bit pissed. Coming in at the end of everything, she wasn't the one who had to deal with all Lydia's questions and hysteria. She wasn't the one that bore the weight of this colossal lie. This time Allison was. Charlie understood all that. She knew from experience the hurt that could place on you. But at the moment she was too riled up to care. At that point Charlie, who had spent most of her time in that car sinking back into her seat and willing herself to disappear into the sofa cushions, threw herself into the sitting position and leaning between the front two seats so that her face was closer to Allison's. "What did you want me to do?" she hissed back. "Should I just have raised my hand and been like, 'hey Lydia, I wasn't there for the home invasion part of the evening, but I know exactly what is going on and you still don't'?"

Allison shut her eyes and took a deep breath, trying to calm herself down. When she opened them again, the frustration had subsided but it was replaced by something else just as painful. Regret. "No," she whispered, finding her calm again. "No of course not. It's just…it's hard. The lying. The hiding. The watching your friend fall apart and knowing that if you just…..you just said something you could help her, but not actually being able to do anything about it." She bit her lip and looked at Charlie, something like sympathy in her eyes. "I get it now."

Charlie's eyebrows pulled together in confusion and she looked at Allison curiously. "Get what?"

"How hard it was for you," Allison replied. "All that stuff with Scott, you keeping it from me. I was _so_ mad at you. I kept thinking how you could do that to me. I never really thought about what it did to you. I get it now. It sucks. I mean, I want to tell her so badly. I want to tell her she's not going crazy. But if we tell her she's going to think we're crazy! My family is already keeping an eye on her after she was bitten. Telling her could just put her in even more danger. I just….I keep pretending that I know what I'm doing, but I have no freaking clue."

"Hey," Charlie whispered. She reached into the front seat and grabbed hold of Allison's shoulder, squeezing it tightly. When Allison looked back up she found Charlie staring at her with an expression of reassurance. Charlie might not feel that reassurance herself, but for Allison she could pretend. She had gotten good at pretending. "We'll figure it out, okay? We're going to take care of her. I promise."

The two girls looked at each other for a long time. Charlie pressed her lips together in a thin, weak smile and soon Allison returned it. Her own hand reached up, grasping the one that Charlie had left on her shoulder and squeezing it back. Neither of them were fully okay—not by any stretch of the imagination. This was taking its toll on both of them. But at least this way they both got to feel a little less alone.

"I should probably go," Allison finally murmured, releasing Charlie's hand. "My parents will get suspicious if I'm home too late."

Charlie sighed, but nodded in understanding. "Sure," she murmured, clapping her hand on Allison's shoulder one last time. "I'll see you tomorrow."

Reaching over for the door handle, Charlie made a move to climb out of the car, but before she didn't make it far. Just as she was about to slam the car door shut, Allison's voice stopped her. But this time it was different. It wasn't the quiet, slightly mournful tone of their previous conversation. It was more cheerful, mischievous even. "Oh, Charlie," she called out. "Just because we haven't talked about it yet doesn't mean I've forgotten about the whole you and Stiles thing. Just so you know."

Charlie gritted her teeth together in a resigned wince. "Great."

"So we'll just have to go into it later," Allison continued, a smile pulling at the corners of her lips. "And by that I mean we will be going over every tiny little excruciating detail."

The wince on Charlie's face deepened. "Can't wait."

With that, Charlie slammed the door shut leaving Allison to drive off in the direction of home, leaving her alone on the street. She stood in Lydia's driveway for a while, watching the house. It was mostly dark, but she saw a light flick on in the downstairs. A shadow cast across the curtains as Lydia wandered around inside. That meandering shadow felt like an external manifestation of her guilt. Charlie wanted nothing more than to walk up to that front door and bang on it until Lydia opened up. But Lydia didn't want to open up—not right now. Even if Charlie was ready to make a full confession, she was pretty sure she couldn't get the girl to open the front door at this particular moment. Plus she couldn't shake the feeling that this night—this impossibly long night—wasn't over yet.

Finally, Charlie managed to move herself from that spot. She turned around, forcing herself to face her own house, but immediately stopped short. There, sitting in the driveway, was a silver Prius. Immediately Charlie's eyes fell shut and a let out a low whine. Slowly, she looked down at her watch, a wince etched into her features. The clock read 8:32 p.m. The only reason Mel ever came home before 9:00 p.m. was for a rendezvous with Coach Finstock. Ew. No. She couldn't call it a 'rendezvous'—that sounded way too romantic and gross. Date? No. That was just as bad. However she described heir interactions it had to be clinical and not sound romantic in any way whatsoever. Excursion? Meeting? Interaction? Jesus, she didn't have time for this.

Reluctantly—almost grudgingly—she dragged herself across the street. Her face scrunched up in an expression of slightly disturbed anticipation. Slowly, she twisted the key in the lock and gently pushed the door so that it only opened a crack. "Hello?!" she shouted, she words echoing against the walls of the foyer. "Mel? I am entering the house! I am walking in the door! If there is anything going on that will scar me for life, I am giving you the opportunity to spare me the nightmares!"

Charlie waited a moment listening for any signs of movement inside, but the house remained eerily quiet. Frowning to herself, she opened the front door a little more, sticking her head through the widening gap. "Mel? Mel, you here?"

Again, she was confronted with silence. Finally she pushed herself all the way in the house. It was completely dark. She flicked the light on and wandered around, looking for any sign of Mel. When she got to the kitchen, she found an origami crane sitting on the kitchen island. Sighing to herself, she dropped her bag in the nearest chair and snatched up the crane, unfolding it until she could read Mel's flowery cursive handwriting inside.

_Charlie,_

_Sorry, sweetie, but I won't be home till late tonight. Robert called me up last minute with tickets for 'Monster Trucks'. Apparently 'Gravedigger' is headlining and it's something that can't be missed. As of this moment I'm not entirely certain if 'Gravedigger' is the truck or the person driving the truck….I guess that remains to be seen! Always good to have new experiences, right? I've left some money for you to grab takeout. Robert and I will probably be grabbing something to eat afterwards, so don't wait up._

_-Mel_

_P.S. I hope you liked the crane's friend. I've been practicing origami frogs now too. I've decided to name it Gilbert. Not sure why…I just think the name kind of resembles the sound frogs make. Gil—BERT! Okay, now I'm just being ridiculous. I love you!_

Smiling to herself, Charlie looked down at the marble countertop. There she found a twenty dollar bill folded up to look like a tiny frog. She took her finger and pushed down on the things back. When she released the pressure the thing sprang forward in a cheerful hop. It was just like Mel. She always had to take something simple and make it into something kind of beautiful. Letting out a sigh, Charlie looked down at the frog. "Gilllllllll-BERT!" Charlie nodded in consideration. "Huh. She's right." She placed the thing on her palm and held it up to her face as she eyed it carefully. "Your middle name's Kermit."

Standing there for a few moments, Charlie looked around her empty house. Honestly she usually didn't mind being alone—she liked the privacy to do sock slides and play Guitar Hero in her underwear—but right now it was completely unbearable. To just sit there while other people—while Stiles and Scott—were out there running around and saving the world made her antsy. She could feel the tension in her muscles. It was like her body was telling her that she should be running around and actually _doing_ something. Sitting on the couch, watching TV and eating bonbons while something interesting was going on….she wasn't built like that. Nope. There was no way her evening was going to consist of Corleone's takeout and reruns of 'The Daily Show'.

"Screw it."

Charlie marched over to where she had carelessly dumped her bag and rooted around in it until her fingers found her phone. She yanked it out and punched in the buttons until a picture of curly fries popped up on her phone accompanied by the caption 'Pookie Bear'. It took about two rings for it to pick up, and once it did Charlie frowned in confusion. It wasn't Stiles's voice she heard on the other line. It was the dull thump of techno music. "H—hello? Stiles?"

"_Charlie!"_

His voice came out so loud she had to pull the phone away from her ear, wincing heavily. "Where the hell are you?" she demanded. "What's going on?"

"_Scott and I tracked the kanima,_" he shouted back. "_Looks like the damn thing wanted to go clubbing. We're outside this place on Hawthorne and Pontiac Street. It just climbed in a freaking third floor window._"

Charlie swore loudly and kicked at the air. "Shit—it went to a club? That place is going to be packed."

"_Yeah, I know_," Stiles muttered back. "_It's got a freaking line going out around the corner. There are a lot of potential witnesses out here._"

"And a lot of potential bodies," Charlie added, her anxiety rising. She drove a hand into her hair, pulling at it a bit, the sting of her scalp serving as a release for her frustration. Immediately she ran up the stairs and dodged into Mel's room. As soon as she entered she was hit by the smell of lilacs. The woman even smelled perfect. "Why would it do this?" she murmured as she plucked the spare set of car keys from the bowl they sat in on Mel's dresser. "Why would it risk exposure to so many people?"

"_Maybe it just felt like getting its groove on_," Stiles drawled out sarcastically.

Already headed back down the stairs, Charlie let out a loud groan and slammed her fist into her forehead in frustration. "Seriously, dude," she whined. "Now I have a mental image on the kanima doing the worm. Not helpful."

"_Um, that's an awesome mental image,_" Stiles replied. "_You're welcome._"

Charlie rolled her eyes and jogged out the front door, barely pausing to lock it before moving to the car. "Come on, man," she muttered as she slid into the driver's seat. "Can we be serious for like half a second?"

"_Fine_," Stiles muttered back. "_Entering serious mode as of now. But honestly, why the hell would the kanima go to a freaking night club? What's he gonna do in there?_"

Charlie sighed and shrugged in confusion—not that anybody could see her-All of the sudden Stiles was interrupted by a distant, more muffled voice. "_I know who he's after_," Scott said. Even over the phone, Charlie could hear the anxiety in his voice. She sucked in a deep breath and gripped the steering wheel, her knuckles turning white as they strained against the skin.

"_What, how?_" Stiles stammered out., his words directed towards Scott rather than her."_Did—did you smell something?_"

Even through the tiny, pathetic, whimpering speaker, the word cut through true and clear.

"_Armani_."

Charlie exhaled sharply. It felt like all of the air rushed out of her body all at once. Kind of like she was the balloon after a birthday party—one that had lost most of its helium so it just sank down to the floor. Sad, pathetic, and ineffectual. She squeezed her eyes shut and pinched at the bridge of her nose. "Shit."

"_O—okay,_" Stiles pronounced, his voice thick with confusion. "_Can one or both of you tell me what the hell it is you're getting that I'm not. Being left in the dark kinda sucks, you know!"_

"It's Danny," Charlie blurted out quickly. "Danny wears Armani cologne."

"_How do you know that?_" Scott's disembodied voice demanded.

"He smells like a forest after the first snow!" Charlie snapped. "That's how I know that!"

Stiles swore loudly and creatively before speaking again. "_Look, Charlie, I gotta—_"

"Go," Charlie said, nodding to herself. "Go find Danny."

After one quick 'bye', Stiles hung up the phone. Immediately, Charlie chucked her own phone in the passenger seat and jammed the keys in the ignition, twisting it violently and making the engine roar to life. Well, not roar. It was more of a gentle purring noise. Honestly the whole thing was a bit disappointing. Mel's Prius might be green, but was definitely lacking the dramatic flare to which Charlie had become accustomed. She needed her car back. Like yesterday.

Once she managed to get out on the road, Charlie broke multiple speed limits. And possibly the sound barrier. That was the one, tiny, pathetic perk you got when living in a place that stacked up as many bodies as Beacon Hills. The cops had more to worry about than issuing traffic tickets. Charlie usually said it took twenty minutes to get anywhere in this town. Twenty minutes of bumpy back roads and forested highways. Twenty minutes of her singing along stupidly to whatever was blasting out of the speakers, even if she had no idea what 90% of the words were.

This time she made it in ten.

Not ideal. That was the phrase that came to mind when describing the place she found herself. She pulled her car to a stop, parking under a rusted, decrepit bridge that was probably coated in all kinds of tetanus. It basically looked like the type of place a serial killer would dump a body. And there, nestled right next to the murder bridge was the club. A dull halo of neon light shimmered around the stark brick walls, making the place glow. It was almost pretty.

"Okay, then," Charlie muttered to herself. With one last deep breath, she hauled herself out of the car and slammed the door shut. As she approached the building, she could hear that dull thumping of techno music seeping through the walls. The ground began to vibrate a bit, each shake occurring with the booming of the bass.

_Jungle_. It wasn't the most creative name for a club, but given the circumstances, it did seem a little on point. Slowly, Charlie began to circle the building, looking for a potential point of entry. Scott and Stiles had to get in somehow, and given the way the bouncer was shining his flashlight on every ID that went into the place, it definitely wasn't through the front door. Neither of them were smooth enough to talk their way through a situation like that.

And then Charlie saw it. Around the back of the building their was a door, it's handle completely ripped off and lying on the ground a couple of feet off. Charlie's eyes fell shut and she exhaled sharply. "Subtle, guys," she murmured to herself. "Real freaking subtle."

Charlie wrenched open the door and stepped through. It seemed to be some kind of back storeroom, shelves of liquor bottles. She slowly picked her way past them, making sure not to break anything, until she found another door. Given the flashing lights seeping through the crack between the door and the base of the door, it led to the club. Charlie grabbed the handle and shoved it open, and what she saw made her jaw drop open.

"Whoa."

Honestly Charlie wasn't sure what she expected to be on the other side of that door, but whatever the hell she had been expecting, it wasn't what she found. Nope, what she found was strobe lights, a total of five disco balls, and a couple of guys hanging from the ceiling doing some crazy acrobatics like they were freaking members of Cirque du Soleil. She had gone through the looking glass, and what did she find on the other side? A ton of shirtless dudes. She kind of liked the other side of the looking glass.

After standing there in slack-jawed awe, Charlie shook her head to reorient her thoughts. It wasn't supposed to be gaping at the seemingly infinite supply of perfectly formed abs. She needed to do one of two things. Option one: find Danny. Option two: find Stiles and Scott and then help them find Danny. That sounded simple, right? Well it wasn't. Between the darkness, the seizure inducing lights and the tide of writhing, dancing bodies, it was difficult to see anything. There was just way too much to look at to see any one thing.

Charlie closed her eyes and took a deep breath, remembering something her dad used to tell her. There's a big difference between looking and seeing. When you _looked_ for something, you got bogged down in the details. Your focus was so intense that your brain couldn't take in the full picture. You had to take a step back, and look at the image as a whole. Yup, her dad was super-into playing 'Where's Waldo' when she was a kid.

When she opened her eyes again, Charlie scanned the crowd. She didn't focus in on each of their faces like she did before, instead letting her eyes slide over them until something jumped out at her as familiar. And once her eyes travelled to the bar, they did. Danny was leaning on against the bar, looking a bit dejected actually, and staring off longingly into the crown. Immediately Charlie made a beeline for him, pushing her way through the sweaty crowd of dancers. Once she made it to the other side of the bar, she leaned against the surface, mimicking Danny's posture. "Hey!"

At the sound of her voice Danny turned in her direction, jumping when he saw her. "Son of a—Charlie what are you doing here?!"

Charlie blew out a long breath and shrugged casually. "Um, I think the better question is why am I not here all of the time?" she shot back, smirking a bit. "This place is freaking awesome!"

Danny didn't respond immediately. His jaw twitched violently and he tapped his thumb against the surface of the bar almost anxiously. Charlie narrowed her eyes and studied his face carefully, trying to gauge what was wrong. Because there was something definitely wrong. Sure Danny spent plenty of time ignoring her and her antics and he probably thought she was an idiot like 75% of the time, but usually it was with the air of a frustrated parent who couldn't keep their kid from doing something stupid in public. This time it was different. He seemed….sad. "Like I was saying," she continued, her voice slipping into a more serious cadence. "This place is freaking awesome. So why do you look like your favorite pet just died?"

Again, Danny didn't respond. What he did do, though, was glance over his shoulder in the direction of the crowd. Frowning to herself, Charlie twisted around and followed the direction of his gaze. She found herself looking at Steve Matheson—Danny's date to the winter formal, his boyfriend—was on the dance floor grinding with some other guy. Swearing loudly, Charlie bit her lip and looked at Danny sympathetically. "I'm sorry, man."

Danny exhaled sharply and shook his head at her. "Whatever."

"When did this happen," she whisper-shouted, jerking her head in Steve's direction.

Danny sighed and rolled his eyes a bit at her question. "About a week ago."

"And why didn't you say anything?"

"I don't know, Charlie," he drawled out in frustration. "Maybe it's because I don't feel the need to broadcast every detail of my personal life. Maybe sometimes if I feel like crap, I just want to keep it to myself."

Charlie pursed her lips slightly and nodded in understanding. "I get that," she said, nodding to herself. "High school is high school. Everybody's always up in everybody else's business."

Danny peered at her out of the corner of his eye. "You mean kind of like you."

"Hey, man," she said, throwing her hands in the air. "If you don't want to talk about it, we don't have to talk about it. I can just call him a mangy asshole and then be done with it."

Danny let out a single, bitter laugh, but a tiny smile pulled at the corners of her lips. "Mangy asshole?"

"What?" she said, shrugging a bit. "Not colorful enough? I can find more adjectives to use. But 'asshole' is still the noun of choice. Or 'jackass'. Or 'turdburger'."

All of the sudden, a third voice entered the conversation. "She's right, you know." Charlie turned around in her seat for the source of the voice and found the bartender walking up to them, sliding a plastic cup towards Danny. "You're better off without him."

Danny grabbed the cup and took a long gulp before setting it back down on the table. "It still doesn't feel good," he said, stabbing absently at the ice.

"Dude, you could do so much better than Steve Matheson," Charlie shouted over the music. "First off, you've got at least two and a half hotness points on him and—"

"Charlie, can you just not?" Danny replied loudly. "Honestly, I'm not in the mood to be objectified by you right now. Or ever. So just stop, okay?"

Charlie pressed her lips into a thin line and nodded absently, not phased by him snapping at her. "And," she continued, fixing him with a meaningful stare, "and if he broke up with you, then he's a complete, utter, unmitigated, facepalm-inducing moron. You are way too smart to be dating a moron." She sighed heavily and gave him what was probably a severely awkward pat on the back. "You may feel like shit right now, but pretty soon you're going to realize that this is just some crap you had to wade though on your way to finding something that makes you actually, truly happy. Before you find yourself something you deserve. This kind of crap is what makes you realize it when you actually get to the good stuff. You're getting perspective. It sucks, but ultimately you are not going to regret going through this."

Again, Danny rolled his eyes, but this time he was smiling a bit as he did so. He narrowed his eyes at her and shook his head a bit before turning to the bartender. "Get her a drink. On me."

"She got ID?" the guy asked inclining his head in Charlie's direction.

Charlie looked back and forth between Danny and the bartender a few times. "I have a library card," she said with a humorous grin.

At that the bartender let out a sigh so loud she could even hear over the deafening music. Danny just gave the bartender a look, and the guy scrunched up his face into an expression of grudging acceptance. "Fine," he bit out, the tiniest bit of frustration coloring his tone. "Fine. But she only gets one." He turned to Charlie, his eyebrows raised pointedly as he looked her up and down. "What do you want? You look like you'd be a sangria type. It comes with a tiny umbrella."

Charlie made a face at the guy and leaned forwards, resting her arms on the surface of the bar. "Actually," she drawled out, "I'll have a glass of Four Roses bourbon. Neat with just a small splash of water, please. You can put a tiny umbrella in it if you want, though."

The guy smiled wanly and turned away from her to go make the drink. As soon as his back was to them, Charlie heard a slightly derisive snort from Danny's direction. "What?" she demanded.

"Nothin'," Danny drawled out sarcastically. "It's just your ability to make friends wherever you go…..it's uncanny."

"Danny," Charlie chirped back, raising her eyebrows at him. "Are you telling me I have bad people skills?"

"No, of course not," Danny replied. "That would imply that you had any people skills to begin with."

"Hey, I am lovely!"

"Sure you are."

Charlie glowered at him for a few moments and Danny grinned back, but pretty soon his attention was drawn away a second time, back to the dance floor. Charlie exhaled sharply, and pinched at the bridge of her nose. This is not what she should be doing right now. She should be betting Danny the hell out of this club, not grabbing a drink with him. "Hey," she said, placing a hand on his shoulder and making him look away from his ex. "How about the two of us get the hell out of this joint and talk it out."

"He could do that," the bartender said, dropping Charlie's drink in front of her with a loud clattering noise. "Or he could do _that_."

Charlie furrowed his eyebrows in confusion. The bartender was looking at something over her shoulder. She and Danny both twisted around and looked out over the dance floor. Their eyes both fell on an improbably good looking shirtless guy. A guy who then proceeded to make eyes at Danny. A wicked grin pulled at Danny's laugh. He gently removed her hand from his shoulder and dropped it before making his way out on the dance floor. Charlie swore under her breath before calling out after him. "Danny, wai—"

"I'll see you at school," he called out over his shoulder.

Charlie spun around, looking at the bartender in accusation. The guy just shrugged. "The best way to get over somebody is to get under somebody else," he said with a smirk.

"Really enlightened," Charlie snipped. She went to take the first sip of her drink—a big one—but ended up choking on it and spewing more than a little across the counter, as two other figures darted towards bar, practically careening into it just around the corner from her. She could recognize that frenzied lack of coordination anywhere—even a place as disorienting as this night club. Scott and Stiles. The wonder twins had finally found their way to the party.

"Two beers!" Stiles announced happily. But that goofy expression of joy was soon wiped away by shock as he looked across the bar and saw Charlie standing there. She lifted a hand and gave an awkward wave. "Wha—Charlie?!" he demanded in surprise. "What the hell are you doing here?"

"Same as you," she called back. "Did you really not expect me to show up here after giving me the address?"

"B—but your car was disabled!" he spluttered. "How did you get here?"

"Mel's out with Finstock," she called out. "I took her car."

Stiles opened and closed his mouth a couple of times, trying to say something but he couldn't find the words. You know who could find the words, though? The bartender. And they were the words that were the most disappointing for anybody under the age of 21. "The two of you are with her?" the bartender demanded, pointing back and forth between her and Stiles and Scott. "In that case, I'm gonna need to see some ID."

Stiles and Scott both reached into their pockets and pulled out their wallets. The sound of Velcro tearing apart as they opened them made her want to cringe. And then they threw their IDs on the counter with way more confidence than either of them had any right to feel. Charlie circled around the bar till she was standing just behind the pair, pushing herself up on her tiptoes until she could peer over both of their shoulders. The photos on the IDs both looked like they belonged in a middle school yearbook. Yeah, they were definitely going to leave this situation with a heavy helping of disappointment. Rolling her eyes, Charlie tipped the not insubstantial remnants of the bourbon down her throat.

The bartender picked up both of the IDs and peered down at them. The slightly patronizing smile wasn't a good sign. "How about two cokes?"

"Rum and cokes?" the blissfully, intentionally ignorant Stiles demanded. "Sure!" He began bobbing his head enthusiastically along with the music, trying and failing to seem as nonchalant and worldly as possible. The aggressively skeptical and accusatory look he got from the bartender didn't even faze him. "Coke's fine, actually," he said, not losing a beat. "I'm driving anyway."

He finally stopped the head banging thing and turned to Charlie, a wide smile still firmly on his face. Unfortunately that wide smile was met by some skeptically raised eyebrows. "Smooth, dude," Charlie said. "Impossibly smooth."

After an impossibly short wait time, another bartender with blonde hair and abs that went on forever approached them two cups of coke perched on a platter. He put them in front of the two boys, but his eyes lingered on Scott for a moment. "Shy one's paid for," he said, glancing over her shoulder. All of them followed his gaze, until it fell on yet another improbably attractive guy. That guy proceeded to raise his own glass and wink. A goofy smile broke out over Scott's face and he looked at Stiles, clearly flattered by the attention.

"Ugh," Stiles groaned, rolling his eyes at his friend. "Shut up!"

"I didn't say anything!" Scott protested

"Yeah, well your face did," he replied snarkily.

"Don't worry about it, babe," Charlie smirked, throwing a couple of dollars on the bar surface. "Yours is paid for too." And then in an unpredictable move that probably had something to do with the several ounces of hard liquor she had just downed, she took her hand and slapped Stiles's butt. Enthusiastically. Stiles straightened suddenly, twisting around to stare at her in surprise.

"What was that?!" he demanded, his eyes crinkling with laughter.

Charlie gritted her teeth, a wince etching itself into the lines of her face. "I can honestly say that I have no idea. Too much?"

"Hell, no!" he laughed. "Do it again."

"Ugh, shut up!" Charlie shouted back, shoving his shoulder lightly. She tried to keep the smile off her face, but given the way Stiles was looking at her, she just couldn't. She turned around, leaning against the bar and looking out across the dance floor. "So," she called out. "The lights, the music….should we count this as our first date?"

The reaction was instantaneous. Stiles wheeled around, staring at her with a mixture of anxiety and frustration. "This is not like our first date, okay?!" he said, waving his hands around frantically. "This is _nothing _like our first date! Our first date is going to have way better lighting, we're not going to have to scream over the music, and there are going to be a lot less shirtless dudes with abs that are better than mine!"

"But there will be _some_ shirtless dudes with awesome abs?" Charlie shot back, a cheeky smile. Stiles narrowed his eyes into slits, glaring at her with no small degree of hostility. Charlie widened her eyes innocently and shrugged. "What? You're the one with the file on your computer called the 'Master Plan'. You can't blame me for trying to figure it out! Is it mini-golf? Please tell me it's not mini-golf. It's so derivative."

"There aren't going to be any other shirtless dudes!" Stiles shouted. "And you know what else isn't going to be present on our date?"

"Jackson in the form of a giant, homicidal lizard?" Charlie inquired idly.

"Well I was gonna say Scott, but yes! That is another thing that is not going to in any way be involved in our first date! It's going to be a lizard free zone—totally devoid of anything even the tiniest bit supernatural."

"But it's not mini-golf."

"No, it's not mini-golf," he shot back. "Of course it's not mini-golf. I—" he pointed at himself "—I am better than mini-golf!"

"Um, guys!" Scott's voice shouted, forcing both her and Stiles to look over at him. "As much as I love listening to you bicker, we've got to find Danny."

"Already done," Charlie replied quickly. "He's over there." Charlie gestured to the dance floor, where Danny was dancing with that dark-haired guy. "I tried to convince him to leave with me, but apparently that guy is more appealing than grabbing some froyo."

Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Scott's face change. All sense of mirth left him, leaving behind his 'serious werewolf face'. The face he made whenever crap hit the fan. "I found Jackson."

Charlie and Stiles both followed Scott's gaze. His head was tilted upwards, his eyes directed towards the ceiling. Behind all the strobe lights it would have been so easy to miss. Charlie wouldn't have noticed it at all if it weren't for that pair of murderous eyes, glinting yellow in the dark. Blinking a couple of times, Charlie let her eyes adjust. With every flash of the lights, she could make out a hulking shadow of the beast, its tail whipping about dangerously. Then she let her eyes travel down. It was a straight line between the kanima—Jackson—and Danny. The thing was poised right above his head. As she stood there, fear flooding through her veins, she felt a hand wrapping around hers, gripping it tightly.

Scott took a few steps forward, his eyes trained on the ceiling. "You guys need to get Danny," he said, his voice deadly serious.

"What are you going to do?" Stiles called out after him. Scott didn't respond. Not verbally at least. He just shook out his hand and all of the sudden his nails were replaced by claws. That seemed to make his point fairly well. "Alright," Stiles sighed out, shaking his head a bit. "Works for me."

Scott began to slowly walk forward into the crowd of dancers, his eyes never leaving the ceiling. After a few moments he disappeared, like a human curtain had been drawn, hiding him behind the dancers. Charlie blew out a long breath and looked at Stiles, pressing her lips together in a thin line. He just nodded back and the two of them pushed onto the dance floor as well, their hands still linked together.

Turns out, wading through a group of enthusiastic dancers was more difficult than she thought it would be. Her issues with being on dance floors were well documented, but she had never foreseen this as being one of them. The flailing arms and legs were damn near impossible to navigate, especially with her hand linked with Stiles's. It felt like they were playing an especially high-intensity game of Red Rover. After nearly knocking over their fourth dancer, their hands were forced apart. "Come on," Charlie shouted over her shoulder. "He's over this way."

As she pushed her way through the throng of dancers, Charlie felt the anxiety in her grow. Her heart rate began to rise to the degree that it almost matched the frantic beat of the music. Stiles panicky voice calling out Danny's name wasn't helping all that much ever. She tried to keep her eyes on Danny, but the ebb and flow of the dancers made that pretty much impossible. Somebody moved in front of her, and Danny would disappear. For those few seconds she would hold her breath, waiting for the kanima to drop from the ceiling and begin his attack. When she saw him again, she would take a breath.

Until she didn't see him again. Suddenly, a thick blanket of smoke descended from the ceiling, descending on the dance floor. The collective cheer that rose from the crowd drowned out the series of very elaborate curses that issued forth from her mouth. She squinted her eyes and wheeled around, trying to get her bearings. Danny was nowhere to be seen. And, suddenly, neither was Stiles.

At that point, it felt like everything had gone quiet. The music was still pumping loudly, but her brain seemed to shut it out, instead focusing entirely on what she could see. Everywhere there were shadows of moving bodies the strobe lights streaked through the smoke, leaving tracks of almost blinding color. Charlie continued to shove her way through the dancers, violating pretty much everybody's personal space as she stared in their faces, desperate to find one that seemed even vaguely familiar.

And then she saw it. A few yards in front of her, she say a dancer fall. They weren't pushed, they didn't trip….they just collapsed. Charlie had only ever seen two things that could do that to a person. Given the context, kanima venom was the most likely. Charlie froze in the middle of the dance floor, staying perfectly still as the others continued to move around her. Her breath seized in her chest as she saw another body fall, followed by another. And another. Like dominos being knocked over.

"DANNY!"

As the scream left her mouth, she found herself able to move again. She violently shoved aside the remaining few people in her way until she reached the edge of the small circle that had formed around the fallen dancers. There were twelve of them, all almost in a line. Somehow nobody else had seemed to notice them yet, distracted by the music and the lights. Her eyes widened with horror and she looked up, her eyes roving around and trying to find their assailant. When she did, her eyes made contact with someone equally as terrified as she was. Scott. They stared at each other silently, each silently begging the other to know what to do.

All of the sudden she saw something in Scott's face change. His expression went from terror to absolute, bone-chilling dread. He started shouting at her, eyes wild and the tendons in his neck straining visibly, but she couldn't hear him. And then, suddenly, she knew what he was trying to say.

Run.

All of the sudden Charlie could hear something over the music. It wasn't loud. It was a low, gentle hiss. Charlie felt her muscles tense up, almost like she was paralyzed. Which was an ironic thought given the circumstances. Slowly, Charlie turned to her right. First she saw scales, then claws, and then those yellow, slitted eyes. She felt her chest seize up, giving her a sharp intake of breath. At the noise, the kanima's head snapped around, its eyes boring into hers. And then Charlie felt rooted. Staring into those eyes, she saw nothing. Behind those eyes were empty black pits. Jackson was supposed to be behind those eyes, but there wasn't anything recognizable. The kanima cocked its head to the side, looking at her with something almost resembling curiosity, and maybe even a little familiarity. Like it knew her, but it couldn't quite figure out how.

It was when the kanima's tail began to swish back and forth dangerously that Charlie knew it was going to attack. When that hand and those translucent claws swiped at her, she was already throwing herself backwards out of its reach. But throwing herself backwards meant tripping over one of those who had already fallen, sending her toppling to the ground. She kicked her feet out in of her, pushing herself backwards when someone else stepped forwards, breaking the line that had formed around the lot of them. Charlie looked up to see who had literally entered the ring. There wasn't enough light to make out the features of his face, but even through the smoke she could see the glowing red eyes.

Derek lunged forward, his arm swinging. It was almost like the whole thing was happening in stop-motion. Each flash of the lights let a single image reach her eyes. Like a series of photographs all lined up. With each one Derek's arm got closer to the kanima, until that one fatal flash where she saw his claws in its neck.

"Derek!" she heard Scott's voice from somewhere behind her. "No!"

But it was too late. From where she was sitting on the floor, she could feel the tiny droplets of blood hit her face. And then, as quickly as it had dropped on to the dance floor, the kanima disappeared. But there she remained, staring at the blank space where they had been just a moment ago.

That's when the screaming started. It began with one person, then three, then ten. It was like they were rippling outwards, away from the site of the carnage. All of the sudden Charlie felt a hand on her shoulder, forcing her eyes away from that one spot. Her head whipped around and she found Scott there, crouched next to her and looking at her through worried eyes. "Are you—"

"I'm fine," she interrupted, pushing herself up from her back so that she was crouching as well. "I'm fine. You go find it—Jackson. I'll make sure everyone here is okay and then catch up."

Scott gave a single, determined nod before releasing her shoulder and getting up to his feet. Before she knew it, he had disappeared as well. Charlie sucked in a deep breath before scrambling towards all the others. With all of the screaming and commotion, there was a good chance that there would be a freaking stampede of shirtless men. As fun as that sounded out of context, in this situation it could be deadly. "Okay!" she shouted at the top of her lungs. "Everybody needs to back the hell up! Give them space!"

Slowly, the circle around them began to widen and Charlie darted around pressing her fingers to their carotid artery to make sure they were okay. Seven bodies, seven heartbeats. They were paralyzed, but they were fine.

As soon as she had assured herself that everyone was alive and kicking—metaphorically speaking—she pushed herself through the dancers as well. She looked around for any signs of Stiles, Scott, or the kanima. Suddenly, she took a step forwards and felt her foot slip. She looked down at the offending liquid only to find a line of drips. It wasn't from a spilled drink. It was a trail. Like something was….leaking. Reaching in her pocket, she pulled out her phone and held it up, shining the light on the liquid. It was a deep blackened red. Blood.

"Shit."

Charlie held the phone out in front of her, following the trail until it led to a door that said 'Employees Only'. She shoved the door open violently and continued to follow the trail until it led out the back entrance and into the parking lot. She only needed to take a few more steps forward before she saw the two figures crouched to the ground between the some parked cars. "Scott?"

"Charlie!" Scott's voice called back. "Charlie, over here!"

Charlie took off, sprinting in their direction. She had no idea what she was she was expecting to find. Jackson. Kanima. Alive. Dead. All of it was up in the air, and honestly Charlie was too busy freaking the fuck out to think about any of it. Because she really couldn't think of a damn thing she could do to fix any of it. But of all the scenarios she could possibly run through her head, what she found was the last thing in the world she was prepared to see.

"OH MY GOD IT'S JACKSON'S PENIS!"

Yup. There, lying on the concrete was a very unconscious, very naked Jackson. All of the sudden, all of the horrifying events of the night were wiped away. Because this? This was so much worse.

"Charlie!" Scott hissed frantically. "Charlie, shut up!"

"Ugh!" she said, sticking her tongue childishly as her stomach twisted. "Oh my God. I think I've gone blind. I'm suffering from hysterical blindness. I think I finally have PTSD. Jackson's penis gave me PTSD."

"What?!" Scott said, looking up at her in confusion. "Charlie we need to get him out of here before the cops—or, or before Derek—"

"He's supposed to be a Ken doll!" Charlie shouted.

"I DON'T KNOW WHAT THAT MEANS!" Scott yelled back, staring at her in wide-eyed confusion. "Can you—can you stop talking about Jackson's penis?!" He blinked and shook his head at his own words. "Okay, that's a sentence I never thought I'd have to say"

"Can it stop looking at me?!" Charlie demanded, gesturing in the general direction of Jackson's junk.

Scott's jaw dropped and he looked at her like she was completely, batcrap crazy. "Wha—? It's not looking at…just help me get him up!"

A deep wince etched into Charlie's face and she gagged immaturely. "You want me to touch a naked Jackson? Are you going to pay for my therapy?"

Scott let out a frustrated sigh and shook his head at her in disbelief. "Charlie—! Just—just stop yelling about penises. You're going to make somebody notice us."

"We're outside a gay club, Scott," she growled back. "I'm pretty sure I'm not the only person talking about penises!"

Suddenly the parking lot was filled with the sound of footsteps running towards them. Both of them to find Stiles running towards them, an expression of confusion. Scott and Charlie both sighed in relief, followed by a simultaneous 'oh, thank God'. "Okay," Stiles said, waving his hands around frantically. "What the hell is goin—"

Suddenly, Charlie actually did go blind. Well not blind per se. A hand flew forward and slapped over his eyes. Groaning loudly, Charlie reached up and grabbed Stiles's hand, pulling it away from her face. "You're too late," she grumbled. "I've already been traumatized for life."

"Guys, we need to do something about this!" Scott shouted from his position crouched over Jackson.

Just then, the sounds of sirens reached their ears and all three of their heads snapped around in the direction of the sound. Blinking blue and red lights were headed down the street in their direction. Shit. The freaking cops were on the way, there were half a dozen paralyzed guys who had all seen a giant walking lizard, and they had an unconscious Jackson smeared in his own blood. They had been able to explain away a lot of crap over the last few months, but this one….yeah she had no freaking idea where to begin.

Stiles swore heavily and rubbed at his chin, his eyebrows furrowed in thought. "Okay," he said, pointing at Jackson's form. "Okay first we need to get him the hell out of here."

Charlie squeezed her eyes shut and wrinkled her nose in distaste. "Okay," she bit out. "Okay, fine. Stiles, you and I can take the shoulders and Scott can take the feet. But before we do anything else someone needs to cover all—" she gestured at Jackson's nether region for what was hopefully the last time in her life "—all that up."

Scott and Stiles exchanged a look before turning back to face her. "Agreed," they muttered in unison.

Charlie stared up at the sky and bounced up and down on her feet while Scott peeled off his jacket and draped it over Jackson. "Thank God," she muttered to herself. "Alright, let's get him the hell out of here. And Scott, I highly suggest that you burn that jacket once this is all over."

Charlie and Stiles circled around Jackson, each of them linking an arm under his shoulder while Scott grabbed his field. "Okay," Stiles whispered, looking at the rest of them. "On three?" Charlie and Scott both nodded in agreement. "One, two—"

"Wait!" Scott hissed urgently, making them all stop. "On three of or after three?"

"Dude, come on!" Stiles grumbled. "On three is always faster! The cops are on the way—we've gotta hide him right now!"

"Okay!" Charlie growled. "We're going on three! Now one….two…."

With as much strength as she could muster, Charlie yanked up on his shoulder with as much force as possible. Until that moment, she had never really grasped the concept of 'dead weight'. Usually it just meant every member of every group project she had ever been in during the course of her life. But now she was here, literally carrying around dead weight. Honestly, she preferred metaphorical dead weight to actual dead weight. The three of them waddled towards the Jeep, staying down between the cars to avoid detection as they hauled Jackson. His head may have slammed into a car door once or twice. Completely accidentally of course.

"Oh my God," Charlie groaned as they shuffled backwards in uncoordinated, halting steps. "How the hell is he this heavy?"

"His ego adds about another thirty pounds," Stiles mumbled back.

Charlie let out a low whine, her face scrunching up with the effort. "How far away is your Jeep!"

"Almost there."

Once they got to the Jeep Charlie let out a sigh of relief, dropping Jackson on the ground a little harder than was probably necessary. She placed her hands on her hips and doubled over at the waist, taking in deep, gulping breaths. "Oh, thank God," she gasped. She blindly reached out a hand, opening and closing it. "Somebody give the keys so we can stow this guy and get the hell out of here."

When she felt cold metal drop into her palm she straightened up and moved for the door of the trunk. Once she was done she peeked around the front of the car, mapping out all the sirens and lights to make sure they weren't in any danger of getting caught. "Okay," she called out quietly over her shoulder. "The coast is clear!" By the time she got back to the trunk, Scott and Stiles were already hauling Jackson's limp form off the ground. After swinging him back and forth a couple of times for momentum, they tossed him into the back as gently as possible, but it wasn't without a pretty loud thump.

Stiles frantically reached up, slamming the trunk shut before spinning around and collapsing against it, breathing heavily with an almost comically exhausted look on his face. "O—okay," he said through halting breaths. After he finally caught his breath, that wince was replaced by a goofy, celebratory grin. "Okay," he said, holding a hand out for a high-five while a goofy grin covered his face. "Good job, team! Let's get the hell out of here."

"No," Scott said, shaking his head. "Not yet."

Stiles's face morphed yet again, this time into an expression of pained disbelief. "Wha—no! Dude, the cops will literally be here any second! My dad is going to be here any second! We need to leave now!"

"Not until we make sure Danny's okay."

"Danny's fine," Charlie murmured back, looking at Scott pointedly. "I checked his pulse and his breathing before going after you. He's paralyzed but he's okay."

"We still need to talk to him," Scott insisted. "We need to find out why Jackson went after him in the first place."

"You think he knows?" Charlie replied quickly. "Scott, there's no way—"

"I'll just be a couple of minutes!"

And then Scott ran off in the direction of the club's entrance, darting straight past Stiles's still raised hand. "Dude!" Stiles called out after him, waving his hand around a bit. "Way to leave me hanging."

Grumbling to himself, Stiles turned towards Charlie. Pressing her lips together into a thin line, she lifted her hand in the air as well. "Sci-five?"

A small smile pulled at the corners of Stiles's lips and he let out a snort. "Sci-five."

Both of them arranged their hands into that Star Trek 'live long and prosper' hand gesture and slapped their palms together. Sighing and folding her arms across her chest, she spun around and leaned against the car right next to him, their shoulders brushing together lightly. She shifted slightly against the cold metal surface, nudging his arm slightly. "Well that was fun," she drawled out sarcastically. "It's been a while since I went clubbing."

"Yeah," Stiles's laughed out, bobbing his head a bit. He glanced up at her out of the corner of his eye. "You still think this would have made a good first date?"

"Shut up," Charlie laughed out, elbowing him a little harder.

Stiles chuckled as well, but almost immediately they fell silent. Charlie bit her lip nervously, staring at the reflection of the blinking lights of the ambulance in the car window in front of her. And then gradually those lights became more brilliant, blotting out everything else. All she could see were the reds and the blues. And then suddenly the sound of sirens was replaced by a single shrill tone. It got louder and louder until it filled her ears, making her head feel at though it was about to split open. After gritting her teeth and clenching her fists she closed her eyes, knowing what she would see when she opened them again.

And there they were—the flames. She was almost getting comfortable with them now, despite the blistering heat and searing pain. It had become familiar. She knew she could fight through it because she had so many times before. And honestly she wasn't sure if that was a good thing. She took short, shallow breaths, feeling her lungs fill with that imaginary ash and soot that burned her from the inside out.

Charlie didn't move. That's how she had come to deal with these little 'episodes'. She just stopped. She forced herself not to react to the pain. Because it _wasn't real_. Or at least that's what she kept telling herself. The flames weren't real. The ash wasn't real. But the pain that she felt…..that was real. But maybe—just maybe—if she kept pretending she didn't feel it, that would become imaginary as well. For now she just looked at those flames and pretended that when they licked her skin, it was barely a tickle.

"Charlie!"

"What?!"

She almost screamed the word. And as soon as she heard the sound of her own voice, the flames blinked out of existence. All of the sudden she was just looking at the reflection of some ambulance lights in a car window. Charlie shook her head, reorienting her thoughts, and then looked back up at Stiles. "I'm sorry," she said in a much calmer tone. She took a deep breath and tucked her hair behind her ears. "What?"

But Stiles didn't seem calm at all. His eyes were wide and there a small crease had formed between his eyebrows—the one that appeared whenever he was seriously worried about something. "Charlie, what was that?"

"What was what?" she mumbled, her more secretive instincts kicking in for a moment.

But Stiles didn't buy her easy dismissal. Instead he grabbed her hand. At first she tried to snatch it back, but he held on tight, prying it open and staring down at her palm. Sure enough he found four deep, crescent-shaped grooves from where her nails had dug into her flesh. He finally released her hand, his jaw twitching with concern. "It was happening again, wasn't it? One of the…" He stopped short, throwing his hands in the air in confused frustration and letting them collapse down against his sides. "I—I'm trying to find the right word to use here."

Charlie gritted her teeth and exhaled sharply, looking down at her feet for a moment before raising her eyes up to him. They both knew what just happened. There really wasn't any point trying to hide it. "You can call them hallucinations, Stiles," she murmured, folding her arms back across her chest as she collapsed against the Jeep. "Let's call it what it is. I know I'm going a bit crazy. You don't have to sugarcoat it."

"No—you're not going crazy," Stiles insisted. He pushed himself off the side of the car and moved so he was standing directly in front of her. "Crazy people think what they see is real—you know it's not real. You….you are as sane as I am."

A highly inappropriate snort forced its way out of her nose. "As sane as you are?" she repeated, a joking smirk pulling at the corners of her lips. "Is that really saying much?"

But Stiles didn't smile back. He didn't smirk. He didn't even groan or roll his eyes at her. "Don't do that," he said, shaking her head at her a bit. "Don't try and make it a joke—Charlie, it's not a joke."

His earnest concern made her shift on her feet. "Stiles, I'm dealing with it."

"No you're not! 'Dealing with it' implies that you're changing something. You're….you're enduring it. There's a difference!"

At the sound of him confronting her like that, she wanted to yell back. She felt that defensive ire rising up inside of her, ready to explode like some passive aggressive—or just plain aggressive—time bomb. But she forced it back down again. She forced herself not to react—to be calm. "Stiles," she murmured, forcing her voice to be steady. "Stiles, it's okay."

"No, it's not!" he exclaimed, waving his hands around frantically. Charlie blinked at his sudden outburst, making Stiles pause. He took a deep breath and shoved his hands in his pockets, kicking at a stray beer can before looking up at her again. "Charlie," he said, his voice calmer this time. "Charlie, what I saw in the library today…I have never seen you….You were terrified. You're in pain. And that is not okay. That is so far from freaking okay that—" He stopped short, lifting up a hand to rub at his forehead. "We have to do something!"

"And what if there's nothing we can do?" Charlie said, shrugging a bit. "Derek didn't know what to do. I went to Deaton—he doesn't know what to do. So until we find something that can help, can we just—can we just pretend I'm okay? Because in case you haven't noticed, we've got a bunch of other problems a lot bigger and a lot scalier that my freaking peace of mind."

Almost as if on demand, a pathetic, whining wheeze emanated from the back of the Jeep, making Stiles roll his eyes so heavily he ended up rocking back a bit on his heels. Finally, he took a deep breath and looked at Charlie, his eyes filled with determination. "We're going to fix this," he said. "Maybe not tonight, but we are going to figure out how to kick Peter and his smug, werewolf, ghostly ass out of your head and into whichever circle of hell it's supposed to belong in. I'm pretty sure it's one of the higher numbers. And—and we're going to make sure that you don't ever have to go through any of this crap again. Ever. Even if it's the last friggin' thing I do."

Through his speech, Charlie felt the corners of her lips quirk upwards. By the time Stiles was done talking she was fighting back a grin. A grin that he apparently didn't appreciate. "Aw, man," he drawled out, gesturing in the general direction of her face. "What's that look about?"

"Nothing," Charlie sighed out casually. "You're just cute when you get all protective."

"Cute?" Stiles demanded, practically spitting out the word. "Cute?!"

"Yeah," Charlie nodded. "Cute."

"Cute is how you describe a puppy! I—" he pointed at himself. "I am not cute. I am manly. And—and rugged. And—and a hell of a lot of other adjectives way more badass than 'cute'."

"Oh my God," Charlie whined. "Just shut up and kiss me already."

Stiles glowered at her for a moment before taking another small step forward, lifting up his hands to grasp the sides of her face. He began to lean in and Charlie held her breath as he drew closer. But just as his lips brushed against hers, the sound of feet pounding against asphalt met their ears, followed by a very intrusive voice.

"Guys!" Scott whisper-shouted. "Hey—guys."

Immediately, Stiles drew back, glancing around wildly like he was expecting some reality TV cameras to appear out of nowhere and tell him he was being punked. His jaw clenched and his eyes screaming murder. He slammed his forehead into the metal of the car right over Charlie's shoulder and let out a slightly disturbed-sounding growl. "O—oh my God," he said, throwing his hands in the air and backing away from her. "Are you kidding me? Every freaking time with this guy."

There was a loud slamming noise and Charlie and Stiles both looked around to find that Scott had already climbed into the passenger side of the car. Stiles looked down at Charlie, his lips pressed together in a thin line. "You think you can get home okay? You're not going to get in any trouble?"

"Yeah," Charlie said, waving her hand dismissively. "I've got over an hour before Mel's going to get back."

"Alright. I'll see you tomorrow." Stiles pressed a quick kiss to her lips before yanking the driver's side door open and clambering inside. Once the door was closed Charlie leaned on the sill of the open window. "How's Danny doing?" she asked, looking over at Scott.

"Danny's fine," Scott answered quickly. "I couldn't get anything out of him, though."

"What are you going to do with him?" Charlie insisted, jerking her head towards where Jackson lay in the back. "You can't exactly drive around with him unconscious in your Jeep for the rest of eternity."

"Look, we'll figure it out," Stiles reassured her. "But for now you need to get home before Mel shows up and we have to get the hell out of here before one of my dad's deputies recognizes me."

Just then the unbearable face of Deputy Sean flashed through Charlie's mind, making her lip curl instinctively. "Yeah," she nodded. "Yeah, you're right. Get the hell out of here."

She patted the hood of the Jeep and took a step back, away from the car as Stiles twisted the key in the ignition. The car roared to life, but somehow at that exact moment another police car—flashing lights and sirens—pulled into the parking lot as well. Only the paneling along the side of this police car was clearly marked 'sheriff'. And as it parked, its headlights were pointed directly at the Jeep. Charlie felt like somebody had just shone a spotlight on her. Immediately Stiles spasmed in his seat. "Oh my God," he said, gesturing wildly at his dad's car. "Oh my God! Could this get any worse."

With almost perfect comedic timing, Jackson let out another groan and flopped over in his seat, making Stiles round on him. "THAT WAS RHETORICAL!"

"Get rid of him!" Scott exclaimed, pointing at Stiles's dad as he climbed out of his cruiser.

"Wha—Scott he's the sheriff at an active crime scene," Charlie scoffed. "How the hell are we supposed to get rid of him?"

"Do something!" Scott protested.

Stiles let out a grunt of frustration and flailed around a little bit before, shoving the door open and running to go greet his dad. Letting out a snort, Charlie closed the door for him, staring at Scott pointedly through the open window. "This is why we can't go nice places," she deadpanned.

Scott just opened and closed him mouth a few times, throwing his hands in the air defeatedly. Charlie rolled her eyes at him before jogging after Stiles. Given the nervous laughter she was hearing from him and the folded arms and judgmental glare the sheriff was giving, Stiles was definitely going to need an assist.

"Oh, and Charlie's here too," the sheriff said, waving his hand in her general direction as Charlie approached the pair. "So nice of you to join us, Charlie. Maybe you can tell me what you and my son and—" he looked over their shoulders in the direction of the Jeep, only to find Scott waving awkwardly from the passenger's seat "—and Scott are doing here."

"What do you mean what are we doing here?" Stiles blurted out. "What—it's a club! It's a club—we were clubbin'. You know? At the club."

At that Sheriff Stilinski's eyes moved from his son, to the club's blinking neon light, to the paramedics awash in half naked dudes, to Charlie, and then back to his son again. "Not exactly your type of club," the sheriff pointed out.

Stiles looked over at the paramedic's station as well, his mouth hanging open a bit. Charlie could practically see the gears spinning in his head as he tried to think himself out of this one. Whatever his response was, though, she could be sure of one thing. It was going to be stupid. Stiles snapped his mouth shut and jerked his head to the side noncommittally before facing his father again. "Uh…" he drawled out, 'uh, well, Dad, there's a conversation that we need to ha—"

"You're not gay," Sheriff Stilinski announced, staring at Stiles with an expression that was thoroughly unamused.

Stiles's eyebrows drew together, almost offended at his dad's easy dismissal of his bullshit confession. "Wha—I could be!" he protested.

"Not dressed like that," the sheriff said, letting his eyes flick up and down his son's form.

Stiles frowned and looked down at his clothes. "What's wrong wi—"

"And not the way you stare at her when you think nobody's paying attention," he said, jerking his head in Charlie's direction.

Immediately Charlie felt her face heat up, but however red she might have turned, she definitely didn't have anything on Stiles. Two bright pink blotches appeared on his pale cheeks. He sent a fleeting glance over in Charlie's direction before staring down at his feet. "C'mon Dad," he mumbled. "Why do you have to go and—"

"Go and what?" Sheriff Stilinski demanded. The typical quiet exasperation he usually exhibited for his son's antics was replaced by something else entirely. Something she wasn't used to seeing on the Sheriff's face. Anger. "Go and what, exactly?" he repeated, his voice growing louder and harsher. "Make observations? Because I'll tell you what sort of observations I've been making. This is the second—" he held up two fingers to demonstrate "—second crime scene that you just happen to have shown up on."

"He's only shown up at two?" Charlie blurted out before her mind could catch up with her stupid, stupid mouth. "I've shown up at way more crime scenes than that."

"That was after the fact," the sheriff said, sparing her a withering glance. "And also, Charlie, not helping. Especially given the fact that you're at a crime scene right now." He paused to take a breath before looking at Stiles again. "At this point I've been fed so many lies I'm not I know the kids standing in front of me! Now, what the hell is going on?!"

The words smacked Charlie across the face like somebody's open palm. They were the good guys. They were the ones that kept bad things from happening to innocent people. They were the ones who stopped the kanima from killing people. With an objective as freaking honorable as that one, it was pretty easy to fail to see the collateral damage. Right now it was right in front of her face. Sheriff Stilinski was collateral damage. It was his job to protect this damn town, but he still didn't even know what he was protecting it from. Charlie felt her heart seize up as the wave of guilt crashed into her, pretty much paralyzing her. Apparently it was having a similar effect on Stiles too.

"Dad," he stammered out. "Dad, I—I—"

"The truth, Stiles!" Sheriff Stilinski snapped.

She could see Stiles's brain working behind his eyes, trying to seize onto anything that might vaguely resemble a viable excuse. "Well the truth is that we were here with Danny," he said, glancing over at Charlie and silently asking her to confirm his story.

"Y—yeah," Charlie said, seizing onto the excuse and nodding along with Stiles's words. "Danny just broke up with his boyfriend," she explained. "Or, more specifically, Danny's boyfriend just broke up with him. He's been pretty bummed about the whole thing."

"We just wanted to take him out," Stiles piled on. "Get his spirits up. Get his mind off things."

"I don't know if you've seen the inside of that club," Charlie continued, pointing at the building in front of them, "but it's pretty big on the whole 'escapism' thing. We just wanted him to have a good time."

The sheriff looked back and forth between the two teenagers, his face visibly softened. Hell, he even looked like he felt guilty for snapping at them like that. Which honestly made Charlie feel like crap. She didn't deserve the sheriff's guilt or regret—none of them did. They were lying for a good cause, but they were still liars. But the sheriff nodded in acquiescence, and they accepted that acquiescence eagerly. "That's really good of you guys," he murmured. "You're good friends."

"Yeah, we are!" Stiles said cheerfully, patting his dad on shoulder in some sort of move of comradery. He glanced over at Charlie, a tight smile on his face, and jerked his head in the direction of the parked cars. "Sooooooo, we should probably go. See you at home, pops!"

And with that Stiles grabbed her hand and yanked her after him in the direction of the Jeep. But before they made it more than a couple of steps, the sheriff's voice called out one more time. "Charlie, could I get a word, please?"

She and Stiles both stopped short, with Stiles looking frantically between her and the Jeep. "Go ahead," she whispered. "I'll keep him occupied for a bit while you guys make a break for it." Stiles glanced back at his dad for a moment and opened his mouth to protest, but Charlie elbowed him in the side to get him to shut up. "Don't be an idiot. Get Jackson out of here."

Charlie spun on her heel and walked back over to Sheriff Stilinski, a wince etched into her face. Of all the places she thought this evening would go, it certainly wasn't a heart-to-heart with Stiles's dad., but if it meant Stiles and Scott could get away with an unconscious cold-hearted monster—i.e. Jackson—in the back of their car, then sure. She could endure a little awkward small talk. Not that small talk with the sheriff had ever been awkward before. But the last time she had seen him, he had pretty much walked in on her and Stiles making out, and that didn't exactly portend well for this conversation in terms of the levels of awkward it would contain. It wasn't until she heard the car door slam shut and the characteristic rattling of the Jeep as it drove past that she realized she was holding her breath.

"Soooo," she said, exhaling sharply as she approached the sheriff. "What's up? Is this is about the 'Do Not Enter' sign that went missing on the entrance to those forest roads off Route 29 because I….I had absolutely nothing to do with that."

The sheriff gave her a quizzical look before shaking his head. "No," he chuckled. "No this is not about the 'Do Not Enter' sign off Route 29."

"Okay," Charlie chirped nervously. "Then what is it about?"

The sheriff folded his arms across his chest and shifted on his feet, squaring his shoulders in her direction. "So you and my son," he said, eyeing her carefully. "Are you dating?

"No!" was the panicked, nonsensical response that forced its way out of her lips. Jesus, she was a mess. It was hard enough getting used to the whole 'relationship' thing on a day-to-day basis. Right now she got to have the 'meet the parents' experience. Only she had already met the parent about a thousand times, she was alone, and she was standing at a crime scene.

Sheriff Stilinski made a face at her, cocking his head to the side in confusion. "So you're not dating."

"Well—well, yes," she stammered out. "I mean we haven't gone on a date yet per se, so technically we're not dating. Yet. But we do have every intention to date. In the future. When….circumstances allow. Am I rambling? I feel like I'm rambling. Yup. I'm definitely rambling. And now I'm rambling about the fact that I'm rambling. Feel free to stop me at any time. Please shut me up. Right now."

And he did shut her up. By laughing. Which wasn't exactly ideal, but honestly given the direction she was going she was grateful for just about anything that made her stop talking. Charlie let out a huff and folded her arms across her chest, rocking back and forth on her heels. Soon enough the sheriff's laugh faded into a light chuckle. "So all semantic arguments aside," he said, waving his hand in her general direction, "you _are_ dating."

"I guess you could say that," Charlie muttered, glancing up at him hesitantly. "Is this the part where you ask me what my intentions are?"

"Well I don't know," the sheriff replied in an oddly coy voice. "Are they honorable?"

Charlie pressed her lips together in a thin, determined line and nodded at him stoically. "Absolutely, sir. I can assure you that I'm not just after him for his body." Almost immediately the sheriff's face scrunched up in an expression of confused alarm, giving Charlie the perfect opportunity to mentally berate herself for being such a complete and utter moron. "That was super-inappropriate," she muttered. "I think I might have Turrets. Can we—can we just pretend that never happened. Like, ever. That would be good. I would like that very much."

Sheriff Stilinski lifted a hand, gesturing for her to stop talking. "It's forgotten. Completely forgotten."

"Thank you."

"It's not something I want to remember either."

"Right," she said, pointing over her shoulder. "I should go now. Far away from here. As fast as possible—I will be violating many speed limits. Aaaaaaaaand I probably shouldn't have told you that."

And then the sheriff started chuckling again, only this time it made Charlie bristle, getting a bit defensive. "What's so funny?"

The sheriff just shook his head at her and smiled. But there was a sadness to his smile. "You just remind me of someone every once and while."

Charlie frowned slightly, furrowing her eyebrows in confusion. "Wh—who?" she asked quietly.

"Claudia," he responded frankly. "Stiles's mom."

Almost immediately, Charlie felt herself freeze up. Stiles rarely ever mentioned his mother. And the sheriff….well he never mentioned her. It wasn't that she didn't want to hear about her, because she did. She really did. But she thought that Claudia Stilinski was gong to be one of those things they never talked about. Kind of like how Johanna York was going to be one of the things that _she_ never talked about. And that meant that right now she felt super-uncomfortable. When she felt super-uncomfortable she had a tendency to laugh hysterically and say even more inappropriate than usual.

"So," Charlie said with a nervous chuckle of her own. "She was a pseudo-delinquent who had no verbal filter and stole disused traffic signs too?"

"Not exactly," the sheriff replied. "Nothing all that obvious. Though she was breaking the law when we met."

Charlie blinked in surprise. She just wasn't sure it was surprise at what the sheriff was telling her about Claudia Stilinski or the fact that he was talking about her to begin with. "She—she was breaking the law?"

"In the most basic way possible," the sheriff said with a snort. "I gave her a traffic ticket. She was driving down this highway about twenty miles over the limit. There was nobody else on the road, no danger or anything, and I was just out of the police academy—still in that power kick phase, I guess—so I put on the lights and the siren and I pulled her over. Back then Claudia was driving this crappy old convertible, so I walked over to the car and there was this tiny, delicate looking woman blasting AC/DC out of her speakers and smiling. And then I asked all those questions they tell you to ask—Do you know the speed limit? Do you know how fast you were driving? And she cut me off and told me to just give her the ticket. That it was worth it. She said if I had a quota to fill, I might as well follow her, because she was going to do it all over again. That it was just too good a day to waste on going the speed limit."

Charlie wasn't sure why—she wasn't sure if it was right or proper—but by the time the sheriff had finished that story she found herself smiling. She smiled because she almost felt like she knew the woman after hearing that story. She smiled because she already liked that woman. And she smiled because she felt like she knew Stiles a little better too. But it did leave her with one heavy regret. That she didn't get to meet her in the first place. "She, um, she sounds like a pretty incredible person."

"She was," the sheriff confirmed, nodding absently. "She just lived. Fully. Unapologetically. On her own terms."

"That sounds like the way to do it," Charlie whispered.

"Yeah, I though you'd agree with that philosophy." The sheriff stepped forwards and clapped a hand on her shoulder. "Go home, Charlie," he said, looking at her an oddly gentle expression. "And do me a favor. Make sure my son doesn't get himself into too much trouble."

Charlie nodded hand shoved her hands in the pockets of her jacket before heading off. Before she made it far, though, she stopped short and spun on her heels. The sheriff had already turned his back, heading in the direction of the club. "Sheriff Stilinski!" she called out after him. The sheriff stopped and turned around to face her. Charlie smiled and nodded in his direction. "Thank you. For telling me that story. Thank you."

"No need to thank me," he replied easily. "It's one of my favorite stories to tell."

"Goodnight, Sheriff."

"Goodnight, Charlie."

Charlie offered up an awkward salute and headed in the direction of Mel's parked car, sliding into the driver's seat. Once in, she collapsed back into the cushions, sinking so low she couldn't see above the dashboard. Finally she allowed herself to feel something other than that panicked determination. And what was it she felt? Exhaustion. Sheer exhaustion. Honestly, she could have fallen asleep right then and there in Mel's car under the murder bridge.

What did the statistics for tonight look like? There had been two murder attempts, two hallucinations, she had been traumatized by a naked Jackson, and she had yet to so much as slap a bandaid on those five puncture marks where Erica's claws had dug into her thigh. She closed her eyes and pressed her lips into a small 'o' before blowing out a breath. All of those numbers added up to one unassailable truth. It was a long freaking night.

Finally, she opened her eyes again and looked at her reflection in the rearview mirror. "Suck it up, Oswin," she murmured quietly.

With that, Charlie reached into her pocket and pulled out her keys, shoving them into the ignition and turning on the car. It was time to go home. It was time to sleep. It was time to regroup for whatever fresh hell tomorrow morning would bring. But then she had to go and flick on the damn headlights. They cut through the dark like a spotlight, landing on a car she really didn't want to see. A red SUV. And inside that red SUV? A stoic, balding man with eyes like a shark. And, most likely, a broadsword.

The Argents were here. And it looked like that fresh hell was coming a little bit early. Charlie sat there in panic, afraid to make a move. She felt like a small, furry woodland creature that would freeze when confronted by a predator, hoping that it would just walk by, not noticing the vulnerable, trembling animal's presence. If she stayed small and quiet enough, she would be okay. Then, suddenly, Gerard's eyes shifted, making Charlie twitch violently. She wasn't sure if he could see her. It must have been impossible for someone to see through the darkness and the blinding beam of the car's headlights. But from where she sat it felt like he was staring directly at her. And those black eyes—eyes that looked eerily like the kanima's—they made her veins flood with ice.

"Well, shit."

**Okay! So there it is. I hope you guys liked it.**

**I hope it make sense that the Sheriff would tell Charlie that story about Claudia. I think he does see a little bit of her in Charlie (nothing substantial—just a general love of life). And that idea for how the Sheriff and his wife met popped into my head a long time ago and I wanted to find a way to include it. FYI, the sheriff also wrote his phone number on the bottom of the ticket so she could call him.**

**Also, I'm really glad about how Scott and Charlie's friendship is developing! I don't know why, but back in 'Black Water' I always kind of felt like I was forcing it when it came to their friendship, so I just decided to let them stay 'friend of a friend' status for a while longer. Now it's evolved, and they really are becoming buddies! I'm so happy about that. They're going to spend even more time together in the next chapter since Stiles is stuck with Jackson and Allison can't do any supe-snooping while at school.**

**Finally, I hope you liked all the Charlie/Stiles moments. There was some cute and some serious. I can't wait till I actually can write their first date. It's gonna be so much fun!**

**Please review!**

_**Chapter 20 Soundtrack.**_

Lydia storms off, Charlie and Allison share their regrets.

-~-~-~-~-~-~Older – Velma Grove

Charlie watches Lydia through the window then walks around her empty house, and reads Mel's note.

-~-~-~-~-~-~We Were Lovers – The Analog Affair

Charlie enters the club.

-~-~-~-~-~-~Swoon (Boys Noize Summer Remix) – Chemical Brothers

Trying to get to Danny through the crowds of people.

-~-~-~-~-~-~The Prestige (feat. D. Styles) - Kraddy

The kanima attacks, bodies start dropping.

-~-~-~-~-~-~Invaders Must Die – The Prodigy

Dealing with Jackson.

-~-~-~-~-~-~It Never Ends – Some Minor Noise (the recording for this one isn't the best quality, but I like the general sound and the lyrics are more than a little on point.)

Charlie sees the Argents' car. End chapter.

-~-~-~-~-~-~Introduction – Kiven


	21. Confessions

**Disclaimer: 'Teen Wolf' isn't mine. Shocking, right? But it's true. If there are any similarities in content or dialogue, it has probably originated with the show.**

**Okay guys, new chapter! I wish you all happy holidays and hope that you all kicked the ass of your exams! Please enjoy.**

**A huge thank you to KEZZ 1, NeoMulder, WinchesterDixonBros, kickarseanime, DarlingPeterPan, Daenerys86, resinswhy, BewareTheBearShark, DraxThePacifist, TheMMMG, Sonny13, Gee Brittany, AmyRoxx123, Lin148, Paige, RealWinchesterGirl95, Female whovian, shy-lady, Exhuberance of Youth (are you formerly Undeniable Weirdness?), Caliweiser, Iste, honjlh, Atomicity, RK13, Hpisdabest, and Marloweee1856 for your reviews! You're the best!**

**Okay guys, new chapter! I wish you all happy holidays and hope that you all kicked the ass of your exams! Please enjoy.**

Chapter 21 - Confessions

"I'm sorry, I think you'll have to repeat that. Because if you just said what I think you just said…Have you sustained some sort of traumatic brain injury?! What the hell is wrong with you! You have come up with some pretty damn terrible ideas, but this on a whole freaking different level!"

This was not how Charlie wanted to spend her morning. Shouting into her phone was usually reserved for after 10:00 a.m. No, usually she preferred to hit the snooze button on her alarm a minimum of five times, reluctantly rolling out of bed at the last possible moment, zombie-walking her way through a shower, and mainlining at least two cups of coffee before she could become fully conscious enough to operate heavy machinery and drive to school. Yes, mornings were for laziness and procrastination and hating absolutely everything. But she had told Stiles to call her in the morning to tell her what had happened, so when the sounds of 'White and Nerdy' blasted out of her phone as freaking 6:42 in the morning, she was prepared to drag herself out of bed and answer it. What she hadn't prepared for was the sheer _idiocy_ she would be hearing as soon as she did.

"I'm serious!" Charlie shouted into the phone, her voice muffled by the toothbrush currently hanging out of her mouth. "You have got to be concussed or something, because I refuse to admit that I am with someone who would do something so…..so profoundly moronic."

"_That's a little harsh, don't you think_?" Stiles's voice mumbled from the other end of the line.

"Is it, Stiles?" Charlie demanded, waving her toothbrush around a bit and showering the bathroom mirror with toothpaste and saliva. "Is it, really?"

"_Okay_," Stiles said, his voice taking a placating tone. "_It's not as bad as it sounds_."

Charlie paused a moment to spit out the toothpaste in her mouth and then stared at her reflection in the bathroom in a weird form of self-solidarity. "Not as bad as it sounds?" she growled. "How in the hell is it not as bad as it sounds?! Because it sounds pretty freaking catastrophic!"

"_Not catastrophic. Just disastrous._"

"STILES!"

"_Look, it's—it's not that big a deal_," Stiles insisted. "_I just commandeered one of my dad's prison transport vans and we're quarantining Jackson until he's been cured of being all murderer-y_."

At that point Charlie threw her toothbrush at the counter, letting it clatter against the granite and fall into the sink. "Really?" she growled, her voice tight and forced. "Because that sounds like a euphemism for vehicular theft of a POLICE CAR and KIDNAPPING!"

"_Bwah…..I prefer to look at it as lizard-napping_."

Charlie's eyes fell shut and she gritted her teeth, forcing back the stream of expletives threatening to spill from her lips. She took a deep, calming breath before opening her eyes again, but apparently—given she expression she saw in the mirror—that calming breath hadn't worked all that well. "It's kidnapping, Stiles!" she hissed. "I know we pretty much live in a legal grey area at the moment, but this one's pretty cut and dry. It's the type of shit people go to prison for! You would not do well in prison."

"_Well that's kind of offensive_," he said, his voice taking on a defensive tone. "_I think I'd do okay. I'm wily. Like a fox_."

Charlie scrunched up her face into skeptical expression and shook her head. "No," she drawled out slowly. "You're more like Wile E Coyote. If I painted a tunnel on the side of a building I'd half expect you to make a break for it."

"_Hey! That—that was uncalled for!_"

"Stiles, did you miss out on the part where I mentioned prison?" she said, waving the hand not holding her phone around frantically. "You're too pretty for prison, Stiles. Word of advice? Find some big guy with a name like Bubba, make friends, and get him to take care of you."

"_See all I heard was that you think I'm pretty_."

Charlie let out a groan, her head rolling back on her shoulders, and she trudged back to her room, dragging her heels as she walked. "Shut up, man," she mumbled as she went over to her closet. "And just so we're clear if you do get yourself locked up, I am not waiting for you or doing any of that 'stand by your man' crap."

It was Stiles's turn to let out a heavy scoff. "_Please, you wouldn't have to wait for me. If I get arrested, you're busting me out_."

"And how exactly do you propose that I do that?" she mused idly, flipping through her clothes to find something Lydia would consider acceptable. "Should I bake you a cake that's high in iron?"

"_Bake a_ _cake_?" Stiles demanded, his voice thick with confusion. "_What the hell does that even mean_?"

Charlie made a face and shrugged, holding up a sparkly top to consider it for a moment. "You know….." she mumbled. "Bake you a cake with a gun or a shiv or something in it." There was a long, slightly judgmental pause that inspired what was probably an unnecessary degree of defensiveness. "Shut up," she grunted. "Don't judge me while I'm breaking you out of prison."

"_Wha—I didn't say anything_!" he spluttered.

"You have a very judge-y silence," she informed him, raising her eyebrows pointedly. "You're probably doing that thing with you face right now."

"_What thing with my face? I don't do a thing with my face_."

Charlie rolled her eyes with so much enthusiasm it almost felt like they were going to pop out of her skull. "Sure you do," she said matter-of-factly. "Whenever somebody says something you think is stupid you do this thing were squint your eyes, wrinkle your nose, and frown. It makes you look like a grumpy turtle.

"_That doesn't make any sense_," Stiles protested. "_How many grumpy turtles have you met_?"

Charlie let out a tired sigh and grabbed a top, holding up to her and looking in the mirror. There was a giant stain on it from that time she had used it as a napkin after eating ribs. Lydia wouldn't approve of that one, and a day like today was going to take some serious ingratiating on her part. "I don't know, man," she mumbled into the receiver, shrugging a bit at her reflection as she discarded the shirt, tossing it into the ever-growing laundry pile. "I'm just telling you what it looks like. I have 'angry badger' face, Scott has 'confused puppy' face, and you have 'grumpy turtle' face. It's a thing. Just accept it and move on."

She heard quite a bit of incoherent grumbling before Stiles spoke again, but she was pretty sure she heard the words 'grumpy turtle, my ass'. And then there was a pause, probably accompanied by his 'okay, what was I supposed to be talking about in the first place?' face. "_Alright, I think we might have gotten a little off-topic here_."

"Right," Charlie said with a solemn nod. "You were telling me how you're moron who just kidnapped a guy who hates your guts and will definitely go after you as soon as he gets out."

There was a long pause on the other end of the line. A long, third trimester level pregnant pause. Which meant it was about time for Stiles's 'oh, crap, what have I done?' face. A tinny, nervous, borderline hysterical laugh echoed out of the phone's speaker. "_We're going to have to kill him, aren't we? Yup. We're definitely going to have to kill him_."

At this point the facepalm was inevitable. She slapped her hand to her face, covering her eyes and shaking her head. "Because that's the way to get yourself out of legal trouble!" she exclaimed, throwing her hands in the air in frustration. "You kill the guy you just kidnapped. How could that possibly go wrong? Jesus, you're lucky you have your looks."

Stiles let out a huff of frustration. "_I thought you of all people would be slightly less judgmental when I pitched this. You hate Jackson_."

"Just because I daydream about killing Jackson doesn't mean I'd ever actually consider doing it."

"_L—look,_" Stiles stammered out. "_We'll figure it out, okay? We always figure it out._" All of the sudden there was a loud, rumbling noise followed by a bunch of angry yelling. Charlie didn't think it was possible to cram so many curse words into a single sentence, but somehow Jackson managed it. It was kind of impressive, actually. As the rattling and yelling continued, Stiles let out a pained groan. "_Jackson's awake_."

"I can hear that," Charlie drawled out in a sarcastic tone. "Is he restrained?"

"_Yeah_," Stiles mumbled, his voice somewhat uncertain, probably due to the violent noises coming from the car van next to him. "_The van comes with these shackle things….I had to put his pants on for him._"

"Ew," Charlie muttered, wrinkling her nose. "On a scale of one to ten, how traumatized are you."

"_I really don't want to talk about it,_" he muttered bitterly. There was a short lull in the conversation during which the metallic clanking of Jackson throwing himself around in the van grew louder and louder. _"Alright,_" Stiles continued. "_I should probably go feed him. And, you know, tell him that he's a giant lizard that's killed like three people._ _Look, I'm probably going to miss school today and—_"

"Don't worry," she interrupted, waving her hand dismissively. "I'll cover for you."

"_Thanks_," he bit out, clearly not that enthusiastic about what was about to happen. He let out a heavy sigh—a sigh steeped in exhaustion and a hell of a lot of frustration. "_Well, this should be fun_."

Charlie felt her chest tighten a bit. She did not like this plan. Putting Stiles in a room with Jackson was bad enough before the idiot had gone and gotten the bite. But now? Jackson had super-strength and crazy healing abilities. That paired with his usual degree of contempt and jackassery….it was not a combination she was comfortable with. Stiles was just flesh and bone. It wasn't like he could turn his sarcasm into some magic shield that could stop those translucent claws. She exhaled sharply and bit her lip, bouncing up and down on the balls of her feet nervously. "Look, Stiles, just…just be careful, okay? I saw the Argents at the club last night. This thing is getting bigger. If I hear you've done something stupid and gotten yourself hurt, I'll freaking kill you, okay?"

"_Doesn't that sound a bit counterintuitive_?"

"I'm serious, Stiles," she said, her tone solemn. "You can't die before I get a chance to make out with you without Scott or your dad showing up and interrupting. That's unacceptable."

"_Well that definitely gives me something to live for_," he said laughingly. But Charlie didn't laugh. She stayed completely quiet. Stiles seemed to hear the anxiety in that silence, because the next time he spoke his voice was low and earnest. "_I'll be careful. Don't worry—nothing's gonna happen to me. I'll be okay. I know what I'm doing._"

Charlie's eyes fell shut and she let out a shaky breath. "Stiles, none of us know what we're doing."

"_Fine,_" he admitted. "_I've got a vague and general idea of what I kind of, maybe should be doing. But I'm gonna be okay._"

"You better be," she mumbled, kicking absently at the laundry pile at the foot of her bed. "I'll see you tonight."

"_Yeah_," Stiles replied quickly, almost like he was trying to reassure her. "_Yeah, I'll see you tonight_."

When she hung up, Charlie wrapped her hand around her phone, forming a fist, and brought it to her face so she was resting it against her forehead. Her body was humming with a sort of nervous energy. She felt as if she was vibrating, like a guitar string after it had been plucked, trying to be still—to be calm—but still shaking the air around it. It was like the anxiety was wafting off of her in waves, and she couldn't make it stop. She didn't even know how to begin to try and make it stop.

Something bad was going to happen. That's what the humming feeling was. It was the physical manifestations of that prescience. She knew. She knew in the marrow of her bones that something very, very bad was about to happen. Honestly that probably didn't seem like much of a prediction. The life they were leading these days, 'something bad' was around pretty much every single corner. Usually she took everything in stride, but this? This was different.

It was a no-win scenario. That's why she felt this way. Because no matter which course they took, one of them would suffer. And sure, Jackson was an ass and she hated him and she probably wouldn't be too terribly upset if she never saw that asshole's face ever again, but that didn't mean she wanted him dead. And it wasn't just because Lydia loved him. Being around him might make her want to gouge out her own eyes rather than look at his insufferable smirk for a moment longer than absolutely necessary, but he was still a person. And from what she could tell he was a broken one—one trying to figure out how to make himself whole. As much as she hated the idea of having something in common with that unbearable ass-hat, she knew a little something about that feeling.

Charlie was taught to never believe in no-win scenarios. It was one of the things her dad always told her. It doesn't matter how shitty the circumstances life hands you are, you can always turn them into something better. Or at least something useful. He would always mime wiping off a pair of glasses—he never wore glasses, his vision was way better than 20-20—then he put those fake glasses on and say to her, '_Charlie, people always say you can't polish a turd. But I'll tell you what you can do. You can take that turd, put it in a paper bag, put that paper bag on the stoop of some jackass and then light that paper bag on fire. Every crappy thing can have its upside. You just need to be smart and creative enough to find out what it is. Truth_.' And then he would fake a mic drop and stomp out of the room, more often than not returning half a second later because he forgot his keys or the fact that he was in the middle of eating dinner.

She actually used to believe that. Not that everything would work out for the best, but that if you tried hard enough, you could find a way to make it slightly less terrible. But right now she was standing at a crossroads and no matter which direction she looked, all that she could see was the potential for more hurt.

Shaking her head, Charlie tried to rid herself of those thoughts. They weren't productive. Worrying about failure wasn't going to stop her from failing. She wasn't going to go into one of those worry spirals. Nope, she was going to actually try and do something. She was going to see Lydia. Which meant that she should probably finish getting ready.

After littering the floor of her room with clothes that were probably clean, Charlie finally settled in on something Lydia wouldn't hate. It was a simple black sheath dress, one of maybe three that she owned. She had actually gotten it the first time Lydia had dragged her out shopping. That day she had been wearing one of her multiple 'The Clash' T-shirts, flannel shirt tied around her waist, and a pair of combat boots. Lydia had knocked on her door that morning and the minute it swung open Charlie had been confronted with that beatific, slightly calculating smile. "_Charlie,_" she had said with that unequalled determination. "_I'm going to 'Pretty Woman' you_." A statement to which Charlie had replied, "_Are you calling me a hooker_?" Yeah, that day hadn't started all that well. And if Charlie was being honest it hadn't ended all that well either. But before they called it quits and left, Lydia had ensured that Charlie left with the one item that was apparently essential to every girl's wardrobe. The little black dress.

Without another though, Charlie yanked her over-sized pajama shirt over her head and slipped on that dress. After that she grabbed a red leather belt, cinching it in around her waist, a matching jacket, some burgundy knee high socks, and a pair of her classiest combat boots. She stood in front of the mirror, giving herself the once over. Lydia would approve. Or at least she thought Lydia would approve. Maybe. Charlie wrinkled her nose and thought about going back to the closet, but then she looked at clock. She had less than fifteen minutes if she wanted to catch Lydia. There wasn't any time for second guessing. Damn it, why did the girl have to go and be a morning person?

After taking one last steadying breath, Charlie threw her bag over her shoulder and jogged down the stairs and into the kitchen. She barely registered the person sitting at the kitchen island as she made a beeline for the fridge. Because she was on a mission. And being on a mission meant that she had to have coffee. A lot of coffee. She wrenched the door to the fridge open and peered in, squinting at the contents as the cool air hit her face. "We're out of yogurt," she called over her shoulder as she reached for the cold brewed coffee. "And we're out of orange juice. And milk. And like three of the basic food groups. I think I see a trip to Costco in our future."

"Mmph."

At that, Charlie paused. 'Mmph' was not a response that Mel usually made. In fact, Mel never responded to anything with a noncommittal, guttural noise. It was either a 'yes' or a 'no'—crisp, clear, decisive. Never an 'mmph'.

Slowly, Charlie closed the door to the fridge and turned around. There in front of her, Mel was sitting at the kitchen table, only it wasn't with that bright, beaming 'I'm a morning person' smile. Not by a long shot. Nope, Mel was leaning forwards over the granite counter top, her arms covering her head to block out the light and her hair sticking out every which-way. Making a face, Charlie wandered over to her aunt's shoulder. "Mel?" she murmured quietly. But she didn't get a response. "Mel, are you dead?" Reaching forwards, she tapped her aunt hard on the shoulder.

All of the sudden there was a weird snorting noise and Mel threw herself into the sitting position abruptly, looking around for the source of Charlie's voice. "I'm up!" she proclaimed loudly. "I'm up!" Then something in her demeanor changed. That typically radiant smile turned into a grimace and she let out a pathetic coughing noise before lowering her head back to the counter. "I'm down. I'm very much down." Once her cheek hit the cool granite she let out a happy sigh. "That's better."

Charlie could feel her facial expression change. The muscles of her face moved and tightened until her eyes were wide—almost bugging out of her head—and her mouth formed a gaping 'o'. She could entirely identify the emotion she was feeling. On one hand there was the sympathy and concern, but on the other hand there was a sensation of genuine mirth. That amusement might make her a terrible person, but given the sight before her she couldn't help but clap a hand over her mouth to stifle the laugh threatening to burst forth. "Mel?" she asked quietly, trying to keep the weirdly gleeful tone out of her voice. "Mel…are you hung over?"

Once again, Mel sat up in her seat, but this time she didn't pop up suddenly like she was participating in a game of 'whack-a-mole'. This time she slowly pushed herself up, her hands gripping the counter to ensure that she didn't wobble too much. "H—hung over?" she demanded, doing her best to look innocent. "N—no. No, no, no. I'm…fine. I'm totally fine. I'm just a little bit sleepy is all." But as much as Mel's mouth protested, the rest of her body betrayed her. Suddenly her stomach gave a loud gurgle and she went pale, a queasy look covering her face. "I—I might be a little bit under the weather."

Charlie's lips pulled back, her face forming a sympathetic grimace. "I recognize that look," she said, waving a finger in Mel's direction. "That's the look dad always had the night after he would hire a sitter. He always seemed to get 'food poisoning' the next day. We Oswins are a puky sort when it comes to the morning after."

A pathetic whine emanated from Mel's mouth and she lowered her head down to the counter again. "Can you make the birds stop chirping so loudly?" Mel mumbled incoherently wrapping her arms around her head. "Shut up! You chirp! We get it already!"

Charlie moved so she was perched in the seat next to Mel. She propped her head up on one hand, looking carefully at the woman while rubbing small, comforting circles on her back. "So….." she drawled out. "You either had a really good time or a really bad time. What happened?"

Mel shifted over the counter so that she could peek up at Charlie. "I remember lots of yelling," she said in a slightly muffled voice. "I remember woo-hooing, I remember a truck flying through a ring of flame, and I remember something called bottomless beer."

"Yeesh," Charlie said through a heavy wince. "How much did you have?"

Mel finally lifted her head, looking up at Charlie with an expression of intense regret on her face. "I think I found the bottom." An involuntary snort forced its way out of Charlie's nose, making Mel glower at her with as much hostility as the woman was capable of expressing. "Don't laugh at me! I—I am vulnerable, and—"

"And seriously hung over!" Charlie declared, probably enjoying the circumstances a little too much.

"I was having a moment!" Mel protested. "I was letting loose. It seemed like the type of place you could let loose."

Charlie made a tsk-ing noise and leaned down so she was eye-level with Mel. "Please tell me you had a designated driver."

"Robert doesn't drink," Mel muttered. "Which makes this so much worse."

"No it doesn't," Charlie scoffed. "Mel, you are never anything less than charming and adorable. No matter your degree of sobriety. If anything it made you even more adorable in his eyes. I find you impossibly adorable right now, in this moment, and honestly you still kind of smell like Jaeger. That in itself is an accomplishment."

After glowering at Charlie for a few seconds, Mel let out a loud scoff and pushed herself up so her head was resting on her elbows. Her still slightly wobbly elbows. "I was drunk in front of somebody who was totally sober. Life lesson, Charlie: that's never a situation you want to find yourself in."

Charlie lifted a hand to grip her aunt's shoulder and squeezed. "Mel, you don't need to worry. Just because you're practically perfect doesn't mean you don't get to go crazy and have stupid fun. Nobody's gonna begrudge you that. Especially Finstock. That guy's crazy and stupid most of the time."

Mel narrowed her eyes and glared a bit, but Charlie didn't get the slightly shocked reprimand she was expecting never came. Instead she got a slightly sad sounding sigh. A sigh that made Charlie's eyebrows draw together in confusion. "Mel….are you okay?"

Mel blinked at the question and shook her head a bit. "Yes," she said a little too quickly. "I'm fine."

"Are you sure?" Charlie asked quietly, shifting so she was facing Mel directly. "Because that look of regret on your face….is it all about the bottomless beer? Or is it about something else."

Mel's eyes fell shut and she let out a heavy sigh. "I—I don't know," she admitted. There was a long pause before she spoke again. The small crease in her forehead—her 'thinking face'—told Charlie that there was something bothering her. Finally, she opened her eyes again and looked at Charlie meaningfully. "I don't drink beer."

"What do you mean?" Charlie asked quietly.

"I mean that I don't drink beer," Mel replied, running her hands through her hair. "I drink wine and the occasional Cosmo. But lately whenever I go out…I end up drinking beer. I'm having fun with Robert, I really am. It's just that….every time we do something, I feel like I—I have to work at it. I have to learn the rules of football, I have to buy myself a jersey and a baseball cap to go to a game…..It never just fits. I always have to try and be some slightly different version of myself."

"Mel," Charlie whispered. "Mel, if you're not happy—"

"But that's just the thing," Mel interjected. "I am happy. I'm trying new things, I'm having new experiences, and that's—that's great. That's really great. But the thing is…..I don't want to spend the rest of my life watching monster trucks. This is not the place I want to end up. I want something that….fits. I know all the epic romances we're fed have drama and heartache and obstacles to overcome, but I really believe that if you've met the right person, there shouldn't be any obstacles. If you really love someone, it should be easy, right?"

Those huge, innocent doe eyes stared up at Charlie like she expected some sort of an answer. And Charlie for the life of her couldn't understand why. It wasn't like she had anything useful to contribute. She was terrible at relationships. And she was barely two minutes into dating Stiles. Hell, they still hadn't called each other 'boyfriend' and 'girlfriend'. It didn't feel like it most of the time, but technically the two of them were still in this weird relationship limbo where they knew they were more than friends, but still a bit less than a couple. All of the werewolf crap kept getting in the way of things actually happening. They were in the process of starting to date, and sometimes that just felt….weird. She didn't know what the hell she was doing. So why was Mel looking at her like she should?

After a few moments, Charlie hopped off of the stool and leaned forwards, wrapping Mel in a tight hug, resting her head on the blonde's shoulder. Mel reached up and grabbed Charlie's hand, giving it a tight squeeze. "You don't have to decide anything today," she mumbled quietly.

"I know," Mel replied, her tone weary. "I've got to go to the shop."

Immediately, Charlie stood straight up and looked down at her aunt with an admonishing look. "Oh, I'll tell you what you're going to do," she said, waving an insistent hand in Mel's direction. "You are going to take the day off. You are going to go back upstairs, change into a plushy robe and either go back to sleep or put on a mud mask and watch bad daytime soaps. Maybe you can leave the house after noon, but it will not be to go to work. Maybe crash a parade, sing 'Twist and Shout'."

"You are a terrible influence," Mel muttered absently.

"But you're gonna listen to me anyway," Charlie smirked.

"Of course I will," Mel mumbled slightly bitterly. "Somehow I always do."

"Well that's because I'm always right. Now get that adorable ass back upstairs. I need to go catch a ride to school with Lydia."

"W—wait, what?" Mel demanded, blinking a few times in confusion. "What's wrong with your Impala?"

"Nothing major," Charlie replied, her voice a little too high pitched to seem entirely honest. She gave Mel's shoulder one last squeeze before heading to the door. "Honestly, she's fine. Just experiencing some…..technical difficulties."

"Again?" Mel's shrill voice called out after her.

"I'll take care of it!" Charlie shouted over her shoulder. "Now get back and bed and be lazy for once in your life!"

And with that she slammed the front door closed and stared out across the street. Lydia's front door loomed there, like the specter of conflict to come. While her eyes stayed fixed, her feet were frozen. Here she was again, in one of those situations where she didn't know what to do. That was happening way too often these days. She couldn't just apologize to Lydia. No, that wasn't nearly enough. Apologies were cheap. And that meant she had to do something drastic.

She had to tell Lydia. Maybe not everything, maybe not the specifics, but right now Lydia felt alone in this. Possibly going crazy, being constantly ditched by her closest friends—Charlie had to make sure she knew that she wasn't alone. And while that might not mean telling Lydia about the kanima, Charlie could tell her about herself. "Suck it up, Oswin," she murmured under her breath.

And with that she took that first step. She strode across the street with as much confidence as she could muster, gradually slowing as she approached the door. Finally she found herself on Lydia's porch, staring at that ornate, embellished brass knocker. She lifted her hand to alert Lydia to her arrival, but just as she grabbed hold of the handle, the door swung open violently, making Charlie jump in surprise. The well-coiffed redhead on the other side jumped as well, but regained her composure almost immediately, those wide, surprised eyes narrowing into hostile, standoffish ones. She folded her arms across her chest and quirked an accusatory eyebrow at Charlie. "What are you doing here?" she demanded, giving Charlie a once-over and taking in her appearance. "And why are you dressed like someone who gives a shit?"

Charlie made a move to shove her hands in the pockets of her pants—her go-to move whenever she felt uncomfortable in a social situation—only to discover that she didn't have any pockets at all. A fact she apparently had to be reminded of every time she put on a freaking dress. And a reminder of why she usually hated them so much. Eventually she just wrapped her arms around her waist and pressed her lips together in a thin line, looking at Lydia apologetically. "My car broke down at school yesterday," she said, inclining her head in the direction of the empty driveway across the street. "I know you kinda hate me right now, but was hoping that maybe we could drive to school together and ta—"

Before she could finish the sentence Lydia brushed past her, slamming her front door and marching to her car with that sort of intense determination only she could show, leaving Charlie staring at a locked door. The whole thing felt a little symbolic—Lydia was locking her out. Charlie felt her heart drop as Lydia stomped away, her heels clacking against the sidewalk like they were trying to tell Charlie just how far away she was. It was probably ridiculous but the beep of the car doors being unlocked felt like a knife in the heart. Her shoulders sagged as she waited for the sounds coming next—the closing of the car door, the revving of the engine, the wheels against asphalt. But it never came.

"Well," a slightly shrill, impatient voice demanded. Charlie's spine straightened and she twisted around. And there was Lydia, standing at the driver's side and resting an arm on the top of the door and raising her eyebrows expectantly. "Are you coming or not? Seriously, Charlie, we want to get there before the weekend. I swear, trying to get you anywhere is like herding cats."

A hopeful smile pulled at the corners of Charlie's lips, but she tried to force it down. Lydia was still too hesitant for her to call it a total victory. So instead her mouth contorted into some weird grimace that probably made her look like a crazy person. "Come on, Lydia," Charlie drawled out, trying to act as normal and nonchalant as possible. "You know all you've got to do is hit a can with a knife and I'll just come running."

Lydia let out a small scoff and rolled her eyes. "Who would have ever thought that you're unhealthy obsession with food could end up being slightly useful."

Charlie bit her lip, forcing back a laugh as she slid into the passenger's seat. Lydia shot her a withering look as she shoved her keys in the ignition, almost mocking her with the smoothness with which the car started up. "Your car is a piece of crap."

"You take that back right now."

"Not likely."

And then Charlie opened her mouth to say….well she wasn't quite sure what she was going to say. Probably to blurt out one of her never-ending supply of useless opinions on absolutely everything. But given the way Lydia's jaw was set, she could tell that it wasn't time for her to talk. Lydia wanted the first word. But she was going to take her sweet time getting to it. She was going to draw out the silence until she felt like she had tortured Charlie long enough. In the meantime the radio just blasted, the dull thump of pop music filling up the car.

"Well, I've decided to forgive you," Lydia said suddenly in a matter-of-fact tone.

"Forgive me?" Charlie asked stupidly, startled by the sudden shift from silence to conversation.

"Yes," Lydia replied primly. "For all of the ridiculous, terrifying things that happened at Scott's house yesterday."

"You mean all the stuff that happened before I got there?" Charlie asked. It probably wasn't a fair thing to say. Sure it was true, but saying that truth out loud while leaving out all the other bits? It turned it into a lie of omission. But she said it anyway. It might make her a terrible person and a worse friend, but she just couldn't bear the idea of Lydia hating her. So said her little half-truths and just ended up hating herself instead. That was the bargain she made.

"Fine," Lydia bit out, her voice still high-pitched and hostile. "You weren't there for the little trip down the rabbit hole of weird and crazy. But that doesn't change the fact that you have been acting super-weird for the last..." She let the sentence trail off and then gave a little, humorless laugh. "You know what, I don't even think I can remember back that far."

"Of course you can't," Charlie said with a shrug. "I've always been weird."

"Obviously," Lydia said with yet another roll of the eyes. "But that was just your aggressively nerdy type of weird. Lately you've been a different type of weird. A secretive kind of weird. All of you have. Allison's not telling me anything, Jackson's….he's…."

Again, she trailed off, only this time it wasn't for dramatic effect or to make a point. She actually seemed lost in thought, her eyes misting over a bit. It wasn't until the radio changed from some benign pop song to a heavy rock song that she snapped out of it. She shook her head to reorder her thoughts and turned off the music before speaking again. "Anyways," she continued, back to that carefully regulated voice, "like I was saying, everybody is just….ugh! Even Stiles bailed on me that time and he's Stiles, whatever the hell that means. He always shows up for you. But when it comes to me, somehow I always end up in the dark. Especially last night, when the power went out and I was literally in the dark!"

Charlie fidgeted in her seat, pulling nervously at the hem of her dress, and glanced up at Lydia's reflection in the rear view mirror. "Lydia," she asked quietly. "What happened last night? I mean before I got there. To you. What happened?"

As soon as the question left Charlie's lips, Lydia lifted her chin, jutting it outwards in an expression of defiance. Charlie could see the whole thing play out on her face—the internal debate. Would she tell her, would she not tell her, would she leave Charlie hanging like Charlie had done to her so many times. But that was the thing. Lydia was lonely now. And all she really wanted to do was talk. Not that she would admit that out loud.

"Look," she said, her tone clipped and harsh. "All I know that is one minute a couple a crazy people who bear a striking resemblance to my friends are marching me out of school to Scott's house. Once we're there Allison and Stiles start boarding up the house like we're under siege or something, and Jackson….."

And then it happened again. As soon as Lydia mentioned Jackson's name, her words faded immediately, leaving her with a thoroughly pensive expression. Charlie hated it when Lydia got that look on her face. The girl was a bona fide super-genius—she didn't have to think hard about anything. Unless she was thinking about something that was really bothering her.

"Lydia?" Charlie murmured tentatively. "What did Jackson do? What did he say?"

Lydia blinked suddenly, shaking her head. "Nothing," she snapped, her voice regaining its brusqueness. "Nothing that made sense anyway. He just accused me of deleting some video of him and—and looping the footage? Like I would even know how to do that. And then he started rambling about me 'ruining his moment'. We're not even together anymore and somehow all of his problems are my fault."

"And then what happened?" Charlie prompted.

"Then he left," Lydia said with a shrug that was way more nonchalant than it should have been. "Hell, he might have climbed out the freaking window. And suddenly Allison's telling me someone's breaking into the house, the power goes out, and then I find you, Allison, Stiles, Scott, and freaking Derek Hale having a kegger on the front porch!" Lydia shot Charlie a sidelong glance through narrowed eyes. "So there you go," she snapped. "Have I satisfied your curiosity?"

Charlie pretended not to notice the jab despite the fact that it kind of felt like getting punched in the gut. Not that she didn't deserve it. She shifted in her seat and tore her eyes away from Lydia's reflection in the rearview mirror to look at the girl herself, an apologetic look covering her face. Lydia glanced at Charlie out of the corner of her eye, but then stared intently back out at the road, almost like she was refusing to acknowledge Charlie's presence. "Look, Lydia," Charlie said in a low, serious tone. "You're right."

Lydia let out a scoff and flipped her hair over her shoulder primly. "You'll have to be more specific Charlie," she trilled. "I'm right about most things. All of them if you round up."

A part of Charlie wanted to roll her eyes at Lydia's smugness. And a couple of months age she would have. But back then they had both been oblivious, and that had made it easy. Not so much anymore. But here it was. The moment of truth. Literally. It was time to nut up or shut up. Exhaling sharply, Charlie steeled her nerves and turned to Lydia, a solemn expression on her face. "Lydia, I have been keeping things from you," she whispered. "There are—there are things that I haven't told you. About what's going on with me. And I—"

But before Charlie could finish what she was trying to say Lydia held up a hand to cut her off. "Save your breath, Charlie," the redhead deadpanned.

Charlie hadn't known what to expect from Lydia when she tried to com clean, but this? Blatant dismissal? It hadn't fallen within the spectrum of possibilities. "W—what?" she stammered out in confusion. "Lydia, I—"

"Charlie, I already know," Lydia said with a roll of her eyes.

Cold fear flooded through Charlie's veins and she kept her eyes fixed on Lydia's profile, trying to find any hints of what was going on in the girl's head. "You know?" she asked quietly.

"Yes," Lydia sniped, sparing one of those patented withering glances of hers. "I already know about you and Stiles. The two of you are together, aren't you?"

All of the air forced its way out of Charlie's lungs in one big whoosh. She blinked a few times and pulled nervously at the ends of her hair. Of course that was what Lydia was mad about. She was stupid for not being able to see it in the first place. With all of the layers and layers of secrets she had laid down over the past few months, Stiles hadn't even entered her mind as one of them. Jesus, Charlie was failing at friendship on even the most basic level. Pressing her lips together in a thin line, Charlie looked over at Lydia, an apology written in the lines of her face. "How did you know?" she murmured.

Lydia let out another scoff and glowered at Charlie. "Um, because I have eyes and half a brain," she drawled out sarcastically. "The fact that you started smiling for no reason was the first tipoff. Your neutral facial expression is more dour."

Charlie wrinkled her nose and gave her a weird look. "Dour? What is this, Downton Abbey?"

"Yes, dour," Lydia replied, enunciating carefully like she was speaking to a small child. "You're face is dour. You know, with your frustration with the stupidity of the human race is constantly written all over it. Plus when you guys all ran out of chem. class yesterday, he grabbed your hand."

"So what if he grabbed my hand," Charlie mumbled, shrugging her shoulders a bit.

Lydia just quirked her eyebrow and looked at Charlie in that way that always made her feel like a complete idiot. "Please, Charlie. He didn't even think before he grabbed it, and you didn't react when he did. People are only that comfortable holding hands after they've made out. Several times. Are you actually going to bother pretending that the two of you haven't got some sort of thing going on?"

"No," Charlie replied quickly, shaking her head. "Stiles and I are….something."

And then it was quiet. For a long time it was quiet. Charlie could practically see the gears turning in Lydia's head. Or whizzing, given the rate her brain generally worked at. And then her face contorted into the most elegant mask of rage Charlie had ever seen. "You're 'something'?!" Lydia demanded. "'Something'?! That's it?! That's all you've got to say?! God, even when you're fessing up, you're completely freaking infuriating. Can't you just talk about boys like a normal teenage girl instead of oozing intimacy issues out of every pore of your body."

"Alright, that was a horrifying mental image," Charlie muttered under her breath.

"Why wouldn't you just tell me in the first place?" Lydia demanded, throwing the hand not clutching the steering wheel in the air in frustration before glowering at Charlie accusatorially. "You're supposed to be my best friend. You know what best friends do? They tell each other things!"

"I'm sorry."

"Seriously, Charlie," Lydia barreled on. "Just because my Facebook status just switched to single doesn't mean I'm an emotional basket case who will fall apart at the sight of other happy couples. I refuse to be one of those jealous types who tries to block everyone else's happiness."

Charlie squeezed her eyes shut for a moment before leveling Lydia with a serious look. "Lydia, you're not the emotional basket case," she murmured. "Okay? I'm the emotional basket case. This had nothing to do with you. It was me just…..just being scared. Scared of the relationship, of what it meant, of me screwing it up. I'm good at screwing things like that up. And…I just needed time to get used to it before it became real. Telling you things makes them real. When something's real it means you have something to lose."

There was a moment there where Lydia's face softened. Just a moment. She looked at Charlie and gave a small, almost imperceptible nod. It might not have been much, but it was enough. It was enough for Charlie To know that they would be okay. But, of course, once that moment was over the mask went back up. "Well," Lydia announced primly. "I think we have firmly established that you need to tell me exactly what is going on in your life at all times."

Charlie let out a tiny laugh and raised her eyebrows skeptically. "Really? How exactly do you figure that?"

"Well how are you supposed to live up to your utmost potential without my worldly guidance?" she demanded as if it was the most obvious thing in the world.

"Right," Charlie agreed, bobbing her head a bit. "You're right. How would I be able to navigate high school without you?"

"I'm glad we see eye-to-eye on this."

And then, suddenly, they were out of time. The car ride to school usually felt like it took forever, and this time it was over in an instant. This time when her heart sank at the sight of that freaking school, it wasn't because of that fact that it was school. She felt her heart begin to beat faster as Lydia pulled into the parking lot. She hadn't said everything she needed to say yet. And she couldn't left it unsaid—not for another freaking second. She might be too much of a coward to do it later if her resolve failed now.

Lydia removed the keys from the ignition, making the engine sputter into silence. The girl flipped down the visor to look in the mirror for one last makeup check before reaching for the door handle. Before she could open the door, though, Charlie's hand darted forward and grabbed Lydia's shoulder. The redhead turned around to face her, a confused crease forming between her eyebrows. "What?" she demanded.

Charlie pressed her lips together in an 'o' shape and blew out a long breath. "It wasn't Stiles I was going to tell you about."

Lydia wrinkled her nose at Charlie, narrowing her eyes a bit. "What the hell is that supposed to mean? Why wouldn't you tell me about that?"

"N—no," Charlie said, shaking her head. "It wasn't that I wasn't going to tell you about Stiles. It's—it's that there was something else I was going to tell you too."

"Okay," Lydia drawled out, her patience waning. "Then what were you going to tell me about?"

Charlie bit down on the inside of her cheek until it started to bleed a little, her mouth filling with the taste of copper. She ran a hand down her face before unbuckling her seatbelt so that she could fully turn to face her friend. "Lydia," she murmured, her voice low and halting. "Lydia, after you were attacked on the night of winter formal—"

"Stop." The change was immediate. Her voice came out scared and high-pitched and this—this look appeared in Lydia's eyes. It was scared, almost feral, like a small, desperate animal that had been backed into a corner. "I'm serious, Charlie," she continued. "Just stop. I don't want to talk about this."

"Lydia, something happened after that night," Charlie barreled on. "And it wasn't just the near death experience. You've been distant, you've been scared, I think sometimes you see things and you're not talking to anybody and—"

"Charlie," the girl said, her voice becoming desperate. "Charlie I am asking you to stop—"

"No," Charlie insisted. "No, I'm not going to stop because I need for you to know that it isn't just you!"

And suddenly the car went quiet. Charlie could feel the tension filling it up. It was like somehow the air had become thicker, a heavy pressure falling against her skin. Wordlessly, Charlie slid her hand under the curtain of hair and pulled it to the side before leaning forwards in her seat. A chilly, air-conditioned draft hit her, making the hair on the back of her neck to prickle. Except, of course, for those four points of smooth, hairless, knotted skin that dotted along her spine, each one driving in at that small gap between the vertebrae. Lydia didn't say anything, but Charlie could hear the sharp intake of breath.

"It wasn't as bad as what happened to you," Charlie murmured, straightening up and moving her hair back over her neck to cover those spots. "Not by a long shot."

"You were attacked too?" Lydia whispered. "Why wouldn't you tell me that? Why—why didn't you tell anybody?"

"Because you were in a coma," Charlie said, her voice hoarse. "Because you disappeared for two days. Because I was okay as long at you were okay. Because I was fine." Charlie paused for a moment, taking a deep breath and forcing herself to be calm. "Or at least that was why I did at first. Then it was because I was because I was freaked out. I didn't tell anybody because….because I'm definitely suffering from some PTSD or something. I keep having these dreams and these flashbacks. And sometimes okay, it's not that bad. And other times I feel like I'm dying even though I know I'm not. But every time it happens I feel like I'm slowly going insane. And I didn't want anybody else to think that too."

Charlie cleared her throat and stared out straight through the windshield as she spoke. She didn't want to know what Lydia's face looked like. She thought she would be relieved when she actually told Lydia something, but she wasn't. Shame and worry. That's what she felt. "We don't have to talk about it or anything," she muttered, tucking her hair behind her ears nervously. "I don't really want to talk about what's going on with me. I just needed you to understand that you weren't alone in it. So there you go."

Her hands balled up into fists and she clenched her jaw, waiting for Lydia's response. Anger. Yelling. Passive aggressive silence. The options were pretty much endless. Finally, she heard something. A disbelieving snort. "Well, then," Lydia declared, her voice returning to that crisp, prim tone. "You and I can be crazy together. We get to star in our very own reenactment of 'Girl, Interrupted'. Yay for us."

And there it was. That one, tiny, glib comment, and it felt like a freaking anvil had been lifted off her chest, leaving her weightless. She knew it shouldn't. She knew she was still lying about a so many things and she had so much to feel guilty about. But this? It helped. It helped a lot. Charlie blew out a long breath, feeling a relieved smile tugging at her lips. "'Girl, Interrupted', huh," she murmured, bobbing her head a bit. "Do you want to be Winona Ryder or Angelina Jolie?

Lydia didn't say a word. She just glanced down at her chest, then at Charlie's much less amply bosom, and finally looked directly at Charlie, her eyebrows raised pointedly. Charlie pressed her lips together in a thin, wan smile. "Fine," she grumbled under her breath. "You get to be Angelina Jolie."

"Oh, come on, Charlie," Lydia said, shaking her head. "In what universe was I not going to get to be Angelina Jolie?"

"I'm getting out of this car."

Lydia clucked and shook her head admonishingly. "Oh, Charlie. Always so sensitive."

With one exaggerated roll of the eyes, Charlie wrenched open the door to Lydia's Beetle and clambered out of the car and began marching towards the school as quickly as possible. It was always fun to listen to hear the frantic clacking of heels as the tiny legs of her five foot three frame had to work overtime to catch up. As she reached the door to the school Charlie relented, slowing down and allowing Lydia to catch up around.

"So," Lydia said, panting a bit as she caught her breath. "Can we talk about something kind of normal? You know, something that girls our age would actually want to talk about?"

Charlie wrinkled her nose and peered at Lydia out of the corner of her eye. "Meaning what? The climate crisis? The growing income gap between the wealthy and poor? The economic collapse of Detroit?"

"Ugh," Lydia groaned. "Why do you always have to be so obtuse? I'm talking about boys. You know I'm talking about boys. More specifically, your boy."

"Really?" Charlie demanded, raising her eyebrows skeptically. "You want to talk about me and Stiles?"

Lydia pursed her lips and gave a dismissive shrug. "You finally defrost your panties enough for you to admit that you've got the warm and fuzzies for a guy and you expect me not to what to talk about it?" she drawled out. "Call it morbid curiosity. Or scientific inquiry into the nature of geek love. You and Stiles together? The two of you could probably generate a swirling vortex of geekdom that will swallow the entire earth." Then Lydia narrowed her eyes and cocked her head to the side. "Is your first date going to be at Comic-Con?"

"That would have to be a pretty freaking long wait," Charlie shot back. "Comi-Con's not until July."

All of a sudden Lydia's hand darted forwards grabbing Charlie's shoulder and forcing the bothe of them to a dead stop in the middle of a hallway teeming with students. When Charlie turned to look at the girl questioningly, she was met with a concerned stare. "The fact that you know that off the top of your head concerns me. Deeply."

Rolling her eyes heavily, Charlie shrugged the redhead's hand and continued in the direction of her locker. "O—okay," Charlie said, lifting up a hand and gesturing for Lydia to stop. "If you find the geekiness so off-putting then why the hell do you want to talk about it so much?"

"Because," Lydia declared, enunciating the words carefully like she was speaking to an infant. "Now that I am….no longer involved with anyone, I need something else to occupy my time. And since Allison and Scott are too busy with their whole Romeo and Juliet lovers in the nighttime thing to be viable candidates. Which means that I must live my romantic drama vicariously through you and Stiles. God help me."

"Oh my God," Charlie groaned, pinching the bridge of her nose in frustration. "Who said there had to be any drama? I don't want any drama—romance sans drama. Seriously, things don't always have to be complicated. They can be simple."

And suddenly Lydia's lips twisted into a strange expression. At first Charlie wanted to label it as pity, but pity was a strange thing to judge with Lydia. Sometimes her 'pity' was pretty much just thinly veiled smugness. "Okay," Charlie exclaimed, throwing he hands in the air in frustration. "What is it?"

Lydia blinked innocently and shook her head. "Nothing," she chirped. "There just seems to be a bit of a complication."

"Wha—"

Lydia raised her eyebrows pointedly and inclined her head, indicating for Charlie to look. Furrowing her eyebrows in confusion, Charlie followed Lydia's gaze. What she saw made her swear internally. And out loud. Because there, slouching against the wall of lockers right next to the one that was hers, was Isaac freaking Lahey. Nope. No. She was not doing this. It didn't matter that he looked like he hadn't slept at all and bore a passing resemblance to a sad, kicked puppy. This morning she was not going to be dealing with any of his shit.

"Oh, yeah," Lydia sighed out, patting Charlie gently on the back. "Things are real simple."

Charlie swallowed heavily, not quite sure if it was out of rage or out of the desire to be anywhere else in the world at that moment in time. "Hey, Lydia," she said, trying keeping her voice casual through a grimacing smile. "You wanna walk with me to my locker?"

Lydia scrunched up her face into an expression of intense concentration and then shook her head. "Nah," she mused absently. "It's getting a bit late. I need to get to class on time."

"You're acing every class," Charlie grunted through her clenched teeth. "Come with me to my locker."

"Yeah…I don't think so. Plus, the way he was making eyes at you during chemistry yesterday? I think this would be a good time to tell him that you're off the market."

"Lydia," Charlie growled. "I'm asking you to be my social buffer. He can't say stupid things that I don't want to hear if you're there. You have a great judgmental glare. It's scared off a ton of people. Let's put it to good use, shall we?"

Lydia gave a prim shrug and idly twirled her strawberry blonde locks through her fingers. "That may be true," Lydia mused. "And I could help you. But then again you have been keeping a lot of secrets from me for a very long time."

"Wha—seriously?!" Charlie hissed. "You're gonna bail on me right now?!"

"It's about time you figured out what that looked like," Lydia quipped, her voice not totally devoid bitterness. "And anyways, it's not like you're going to be able to avoid him forever. Just grow a pair and get it out of the way." And with one last satisfied smirk, Lydia spun on her heels and began to march the other way down the hall, her hips swaying confidently as she did so. "I'll see you at lunch!"

"Stop enjoying this!" Charlie shouted after her.

"Not likely!"

"That's not even the way to your locker!"

But Lydia rounded the corner anyway, refusing to admit defeat or lose style points. Grumbling to herself, Charlie turned back to face her locker. And that's when she discovered the downside of frantically shouting at someone in the middle of a hallway. People tended to hear you. Especially when they had finely tuned werewolf senses. Isaac was still leaning against the lockers, but now he wasn't just staring off into space. He was looking directly at her. Fan-freaking-tastic.

Charlie squeezed her eyes shut and let out a pathetic whine, wishing he would just disappear, but when she opened them again he was still standing there. It was strange. He almost looked like the old Isaac—the Isaac she had met at the dance, the one with the black eye she drove to school that one time. Those big blue eyes were all soulful and apologetic. And you know what? That pissed her off. A lot.

Letting out an angry huff, Charlie marched forwards, gradually slowing to a stop in front of him. "Isaac," she spat bitterly. "I see you're conscious again. Good for you."

Isaac looked down at the floor and exhaled sharply—something between a laugh and a despondent sigh—before glancing up at her. Head bowed, furrowed eyebrows….he was really pulling out all the stops for this one. "Charlie, I—"

"You're on my locker," she interrupted bluntly.

Isaac blinked, a bit surprised by the harshness in her demeanor. Not that she could understand why. "W—what?"

"My locker?" Charlie repeated, waving her hands around a bit. "You know, the surface you're currently leaning against. Whilst you are leaning against it, I am unable to access it."

Isaac wrinkled his nose in mild confusion. He looked to his left, staring at the lockers like he was surprised to see them there. He pushed himself off of the metal surface and shoved his hands in his pockets. Charlie didn't look at him directly as she pushed her way towards her locker, but she could feel his eyes on her as she dialed in the combination and yanked the door open. It felt like they were boring a hole in her skin. "If Derek wants information on Jackson, you can forget it," she declared, her head still inside her locker. "I'm not telling any of you a damn thing. So you might as well save your breath and get the hell out of here right now."

"I didn't come here for Derek," Isaac replied, only the barest hint of apathetic swagger contained within the phrase.

Charlie let out a bitter snort and stayed facing her locker, exchanging her books. "Are you sure?" she demanded as she shoved her chemistry text into her messenger bag. "Because these days you seem to be doing pretty much whatever the hell he tells you to do. I think that makes you a minion."

Isaac blinked, his face scrunching up into an odd combination of confusion and amusement. "A minion?" he drawled out. "One of those little yellow things that runs around making weird noises?"

Slamming the door of her locker shut, Charlie spun around and folded her arms across he chest, leveling Isaac with a deadly look. "No," she snapped. "A minion as in the underling of an authority figure who unquestioningly and blindly does that person's bidding no matter the cost."

"I—I'm not a minion, okay," Isaac shot back, actually looking a little offended. "Look, Charlie, I didn't come here to fight with you. I came here to talk."

Charlie felt her lips pull back into a semi-hostile sneer. "Isaac, I just stabbed you with a pencil that was covered in a paralytic. Why don't you go ahead and ask yourself what kind of message that sends."

"I think it shows that you're just really demonstrative when you're expressing your feelings," he deadpanned. "You were feeling anger, so you stabbed me. That's legitimate. I'm not holding a grudge." There was a tiny half-smile on his face, like he was hoping that she would soften or maybe even laugh. Like he was hoping for her normal reaction to snarky banter. Fat chance of that. When Charlie didn't respond, Isaac's face fell. He ran his hands down his face, rubbing at his eyes a bit, and when he pulled his hands away, he seemed torn between exhaustion and frustration. "I'm trying to apologize," he murmured. "For what happened last night and yesterday."

"Just call it what it is, Isaac," Charlie spat, her eyes narrowed dangerously. "Attempted murder."

A wince etched itself into the lines of Isaac's face and he averted his eyes, staring at his feet. "Look, Charlie—"

"I'm with Stiles."

She just blurted out the words. She wasn't sure why she did it. All she knew was that she wanted Isaac to go away and stop trying to apologize for something there was no way in hell she was going to forgive him for. And the words had their desired effect. Isaac twitched violently and his eyes snapped to hers, a sort of frantic look in them. "What?"

Charlie sighed loudly and readjusted the strap of her bag on her shoulder. "I'm with Stiles now," she repeated. "Romantic-style. So that's a thing."

Isaac paused for a moment. As the initial shock of the revelation wore off, he eased back into that casual, blasé attitude he had adopted of late. "Seriously?" he drawled out, almost sarcastically. "Well that's disappointing. And kind of unbelievable." And then a crease formed between Isaac's eyebrows and he began blinking rapidly, like he was thinking very hard about something. "Wait, do you—do you think that I'm apologizing to you because of what I said in chemistry class—me saying that I was hitting on you?" he asked, looking at her seriously. "You think I've got some sort of agenda here?"

Charlie exhaled sharply and shrugged her shoulders. "Honestly, Isaac?" she sighed out, shaking her head. "I don't know. Maybe. Probably. Everybody has an agenda."

"Come on, Charlie! You know I wouldn't—"

"No, I don't, Isaac," Charlie interrupted, narrowing her eyes at him dangerously. "Apparently I don't. You see, I know I never really got to know you all that well, but I thought you were a sweet, shy guy who had been dealt a seriously shitty hand. And I thought that when you turned that you would be the type of person who would use that strength to, I don't know, maybe help some people. People like who you used to be. But what happened? You became a cocky ass who jokes about killing people—about killing _innocent_ people. You picked feeling powerful over the most basic human decency. So you, Derek, Erica—hell, even Boyd—all of you can go screw yourselves. Because clearly I don't know any of you at all."

"Charlie, I'm saying that I'm sorry!"

"And I'm saying that's not enough!" she hissed. It was rising up in her all over again—the anger. She felt that characteristic tingling in her fingers that made her hands clench into fists, her nails digging into her palms as she fought the urge to hit something. She ground her teeth together trying to push it all back down—to get the anger to stop choking her for long enough to say what she needed to say.

"Apologies are cheap," she said, her voice echoing despite the fact that she was whispering. "It's just—it's just air passing over the vocal chords. And I'm not good at forgiveness. You tried to kill my best friend and turned it into something that you and the rest of your pack can high-five each other over. You _enjoyed_ it. Real team-bonding experience, right? That's going to take a hell of a lot more than a couple of 'I'm sorrys'. You want my forgiveness? Do something that makes me think you freaking deserve it."

The words hung in the air between them as they stared each other down. Charlie could see hurt and anger in Isaac's eyes. But that was kind of the point, wasn't it? He didn't get to just blink some big, blue puppy dog eyes and be forgiven. Actions had consequences, it was one of the first things she learned in life, so she just returned that moody stare, refusing to back down. His jaw twitched violently and he ground his teeth together, almost like he wanted to say something. But whatever it was she would never know, because suddenly a dark-haired figure appeared at her shoulder and it wasn't just her and Isaac standing there anymore.

"Hey," Scott murmured, moving so that he was standing almost between her and Isaac. "Is everything alright here?"

Charlie stared Isaac down for a few more moments before her eyes flicked to Scott. He was standing there, hands on his hips, looking between her and Isaac with that constipated look he usually got when he was worried about something. She pressed her lips together in a thin line and nodded. "Yeah," she said, nodding a bit. "Yeah, everything's fine. Isaac here was just leaving."

Isaac's hands started clenching and unclenching into fists. He was getting frustrated now, and he didn't quite have a good enough handle on the werewolf thing yet to be unaffected by it. "Right," he agreed, his voice tinged with bitterness. "I was just leaving."

Isaac spun on his heel and marched away from the two of them. His shoulders were tense and rigid, angry disappointment rolling off of him in waves. Charlie felt a slight twinge of guilt in her gut as he stalked off, but she ignored it. She had meant what she said earlier. Apologies were cheap. And most of the time they were more for the person doing the apologizing than for the person that was being apologized to. It was an easy out—you never actually have to fix anything.

When Isaac was finally out of earshot—which took a while given his more recently developed abilities—Scott placed a hand on Charlie's shoulder, making her glance up at him. "Are you okay?" he asked, giving her a meaningful look.

"Yeah," she replied quickly. "I'm fine."

Scott looked down the hall at Isaac's retreating figure, squinting after him with a slightly bemused expression. "What was all that about?" he asked, nodding in Isaac's direction.

Charlie sighed and turned away from Isaac to face Scott. "Trust me when I say you don't want to know."

"He didn't threaten you, did he?"

The urgent concern in his eyes made Charlie let out a bitter laugh. "Worse," she replied. "He tried to apologize."

Scott made a face at her, clearly not understanding her warped logic, and then sighed as well. "Man," he groaned. "Everything is getting so screwed up."

"Yeah, in more ways than one," Charlie shot back, raising her eyebrows at him pointedly. "Stealing a police car? Really? That's your genius plan."

Scott opened and closed his mouth a few times, clearly at a loss for what to say. "That was Stiles's idea," he finally said, throwing his hands in the air.

"Yeah," Charlie replied. "And as Stiles's best friend, it's your job to stop him from doing stupid crap."

Scott covered his face with his hands and let out a loud groan. When he withdrew his hands his face was screwed up into a goofy, bemused look. "At least there's no way it can get worse, right?" he demanded, shrugging innocently.

As soon as the words left his lips, a wave of horrified disbelief swept through Charlie. Her mouth dropped open and, seemingly of its own accord, her fist swung out and punched Scott hard in the shoulder making him jump. "Are you freaking kidding me?" Charlie growled, cutting off any accusatory complaints he might have wanted to share. "Seriously, Scott, why would you go and say anything like that? Everybody knows that as soon as someone says 'there's no way things can get worse', things get worse!"

"Come on, Charlie," Scott shot back. "You don't really think—"

But before Scott could even finish the sentence, two men strode down the hallway, both of whom were clearly not a part of the student body. In their arms one held a ladder and the other what looked like a security camera—the type they keep outside of banks and government buildings. Charlie and Scott both watched in horror as the men planted the ladder on the ground and proceeded to screw that damn camera to the wall. Yup. It got worse.

"Oh my God," Scott whispered from next to her. "We are so screwed."

Charlie had seemingly lost all power of speech. All she could do was nod stupidly as she saw the horizon of her freedom shrink that much more. The school had been a battleground before, but now it had been taken—it was occupied enemy territory. They were living in the belly of the beast, and eyes were everywhere. And now she sounded paranoid. High school had finally managed to make her paranoid, and not for the usual reasons. It was a war. Sure it was a covert war where both sides ended up having really awkward dinner parties with a startling frequency, but it was still a war. And she couldn't shake the feeling that they were losing.

Then she heard it. That cold voice that pretended to be warm.

"Miss Oswin."

Her name had never sounded so freaking terrifying. Charlie felt her breathing hitch and her jaw clench. Slowly, she turned to her left only to be met with cold eyes of bottomless cruelty. Or maybe she was just being dramatic. He was Allison's grandpa after all. But that fact alone didn't mean he wasn't scary as hell. Charlie swallowed heavily and nodded at him in acknowledgement. "Sir."

And then he smiled at her, those teeth glinting ominously in the fluorescent lighting. "Would you mind joining me in my office? I have some things I'd like to discuss with you."

Without another word, Grandpa continued on his way past her in the direction of his office. From the way he walking it seemed like she was meant to follow him. To the principal's office. His office. Where the two of them would sit. Alone. As she watched him go, Charlie felt like she was sinking down, down into the abyss. Which would probably still have been a better place to be than the principal's office.

Charlie blew out a long breath, wondering whether or not she should just let in the despair and be done with it. "Well, shit."

**Okay, guys, that's a new chapter. I'm sure you're all mad at me for how Charlie acted towards Isaac. I love him as a character, but he tried to kill Lydia and that's not something Charlie just forgives. Not ever. And, like with Derek, he's going to actually have to do something that earns her forgiveness.**

**I guess this chapter felt a bit like filler, but I'm happy with it. A (hopefully) cute Starlie scene, finally checking in with Mel, revealing something to Lydia, and more Charlie/Scott time. All good things I guess!**

**Please review. After all it is the holidays!**


	22. Now Don't Panic, But

**Disclaimer: 'Teen Wolf' isn't mine. Shocking, right? But it's true. If there are any similarities in content or dialogue, it has probably originated with the show.**

**A huge thank you to cecld16, KEZZ 1, meels234, AcklesIdjit, WinchesterDixonBros, katiesgotagun, TheMMMG, Noxen, kickarseanime, resinswhy, RK13, AmyRoxx123, Gee Brittany, Exuberance of Youth, chibi-Clar, Iste, onethousandmoths, NeoMulder, Guest, Female whovian, Cameron, Lightpurple96, The City of Books, Anonymous, Liz, kingcastles, Lily, Kristen, and TheHallow for reviewing! You guys are the best!**

**Alright, sorry this took so long, but there's a reason. I wanted to finish 'Frenemy' in this chapter. I was committed to finishing 'Frenemy' in this chapter. Then I hit page 33 in my word document and I STLL HAVEN'T FINISHED. So since this chapter was turning into a book, I decided to cut it in half to make it more digestible. So, bad news, there's less Stiles in this than I would have liked. Good news, I'm mostly done with the next chapter. Yay!**

Chapter 22 – Now Don't Panic, But…

The office smelled funny. For some reason that was the thought that kept running through Charlie's head. It didn't make much sense, really. There were probably a lot of better things for her to be thinking about—more important things, more pressing things. But for some reason it was the smell that stayed at the forefront of her brain. She couldn't quite place it. It was an acrid, smelling vaguely of decay. Maybe it was just that 'old person' smell. All of the old people Charlie had ever met had a weirdly distinctive smell. Sometimes it was body odor, sometimes it was old food, sometimes it was really strong, oppressive perfumes, but it always had some element of decay. Maybe Grandpa Argent didn't just smell like decay. Maybe he smelled like death. And mothballs.

Or maybe she was overreacting. But the guy was still creepy as hell.

As she sat in that chair, Charlie could feel herself humming with anxiety. It felt like there was an electrical current running through her nerves, so much so that she had to grab onto the armrests of the chair to keep herself from twitching violently. She heard Grandpa Argent somewhere behind her, flipping through some pages. Charlie forced herself to stare straight forwards and not look at him, but she could feel where he was in the room. The guy exuded this threatening aura that made it impossible to ignore. "So," Charlie chirped, trying hard to keep her voice from going to that high-pitched place it always seemed to reach whenever she was closed in a room with him. "So am I in trouble or something."

"Well that depends," Grandpa Argent drawled out, his voice somehow managing to be casual and threatening at the same time. He circled around his desk and slid into his seat, placing his elbows on the table and resting his head on his hands, staring her down. "Is there anything that you care to confess?"

Charlie blew out a long breath and shook her head. "No, sir. Nothing that I can recall."

Grandpa Argent smiled in response. Were his teeth pointy? She could swear that his teeth were pointy. Shark-like teeth to match those dark, beady eyes of his. "Well that's good to hear," he replied, a cold mirth filling his voice. "It wouldn't want to have to reprimand one of my granddaughter's closest friends. I would make for some fairly awkward dinner parties."

Charlie forced herself to chuckle, nodding in agreement as she did. "Well, um, sir….if you don't mind me asking, why am I here?"

Grandpa Argent pressed his lips together in a smile that was probably meant to be warm or comforting, but really just ended up being menacing. "You're here because we do not tolerate bullying on this campus."

Charlie scrunched up her face into a perplexed look and collapsed back in her seat. "Bullying? I haven't been bullying anybody. And if Aaron Harrison says any different then he—" she pointed at him awkwardly "—he is a lying liar."

A deep, guttural chuckle emanated from Grandpa Argent's mouth, making Charlie shrink in her seat a little bit. "You misunderstand me, Charlie," Grandpa Argent replied. "I wasn't making an accusation."

Charlie froze, widening her eyes and glancing around the room evasively. "Oh," she muttered quietly. "Um…..well then why am I here, then?"

Grandpa Argent sighed and began rifling through some of the papers on his desk. "It was brought to my attention that your car was left in the parking lot last night. The battery was removed and this note was found near the wheel."

Out of the stack of papers he extracted one that was slightly crumpled and stained. He placed it in front of Charlie, and she found herself looking at Erica's handwriting, scrawled out in bright red lipstick. Charlie glanced between him and the pages a few times before folding her arms across her chest and shrugging evasively. "So?"

"So we do not tolerate bullying," Grandpa Argent repeated. "If there is anybody that you're having a problem with, you can let somebody know." He narrowed his eyes at her curiously, like he was measuring her up, and raised his clasped hands to his face, covering his mouth. Once again, like every other time she found herself confronted by the man, she felt like she was being measured up—like she was a threat being assessed. "So tell me, Charlie," he said after an appropriately long dramatic pause, "is there anything you might want to share with me?"

Charlie made a face and shook her head. "No," she said quickly. "No, everything's fine with me. Nothing I can't take care of on my own, sir."

Grandpa Argent nodded slowly. "Good," he replied. "I'm glad to hear it. But if you are ever in need of help, I want you to know that you can approach me directly. This administration is serious about the safety and wellbeing of all the students at Beacon Hills High, especially those who are friends with my granddaughter. I must confess that I am not above nepotism."

"So is that what the new Orwellian décor is about," she blurted out before she could make herself stop. "Student wellbeing?"

The moment the words left her lips, she began mentally kicking herself. Stupid, stupid Charlie and her stupid giant gaping mouth. Rule one when you're living in a dictatorship was to not point out to the dictator that you recognized it as a dictatorship. And what had she gone and done? She had made a freaking George Orwell reference. Great plan, Charlie.

"Ah, you mean the cameras?" Grandpa Argent replied in that oily tone of his. Again, that toothy, terrifying smile pulled at his lips. "I take safety very seriously, Charlie," he murmured. "Especially given this school's history. I believe you are familiar with some of the past crises."

Charlie swallowed heavily and nodded in understanding. He was talking about the night they had been trapped in the school with the alpha—the night the janitor was killed. For someone so skilled in doublespeak and evasiveness, Gerard definitely found a way to get his point across, clear as day. The man had very little subtlety, really. Her takeaway from this little conversation? Grandpa Argent was at least a little suspicious of her. "Yes, sir," she replied, keeping as cool a demeanor as possible. "I am familiar."

"And I trust that you would try to avoid other such situations," he declared, raising his eyebrows pointedly.

Charlie widened her eyes innocently and nodded. "Of course."

"Good," Grandpa Argent shot back. It was a simple enough response—one syllable, four letters. But that single word echoed in her ears. It was a heavy word, loaded with expectation and warning. And all Charlie could do was smile and pretend that she didn't notice. After all, innocent people don't notice veiled threats. Charlie just nodded in what she hoped looked like tacit, unconcerned agreement. "So," she chirped, jerking a thumb in the direction of the door. "Can I go, or….."

Grandpa Argent smiled blandly and waved for her to leave. "Absolutely. Have a good day. And keep yourself out of trouble."

Clapping her hands on the hand rests, Charlie pushed herself out of the chair and made a beeline for the door, eager to get the hell out of there as soon as possible. But just as she managed to grasp the doorknob, she heard the light clearing of a throat making her stop. Immediately her eyes fell shut and she swore internally. Of course that wasn't all he wanted to ask. And of course he would wait till the last possible moment to catch her off her guard. She needed to learn to anticipate him better. Gritting her teeth, she turned back around to find Gerard staring at her, his face deceptively serene. "Was there anything else, sir?" she asked, blinking obliviously.

Grandpa Argent shrugged casually at her. "You are friends with the misters Stiles Stilinski and Jackson Whittemore, is that correct?"

Charlie felt her teeth clench and her pulse spike, but forced herself to stay collected. She was pretty sure that he could see past it. With that cold gaze of his she wouldn't be surprised if he could see the quick throbbing of her carotid artery, but she just nodded calmly. "I'm friends with Stiles. Jackson and I don't really talk anymore, though. Why?"

"Oh, nothing for you to worry about," he said, waving a hand dismissively. "It just so happens that neither of them were seen in their homeroom this morning. You wouldn't happen to know anything about that, would you?"

"I don't know anything about Jackson," she said, shaking her head a bit. "Stiles is sick, though. He asked me to take English notes for him."

"Hm," Gerard mumbled. "We weren't contacted by his father. Usually in these cases the parent will notify us of their child's absence."

"Well the sheriff's been a little busy lately," Charlie replied, wrinkling her nose a bit.

All of the sudden, Grandpa Argent smiled, and Charlie couldn't help but feel like she had walked straight into some sort of verbal trap. Straight into it. Like an oblivious asshole. Fantastic. "Ah, yes," he drawled. "The sheriff's department has been a bit…..overworked of late. All that unpleasantness last night at that club…..What was it called?"

"Um, I'm not sure…" Charlie mumbled evasively. "I didn't get a chance to check the paper this morning."

"Right." Grandpa Argent leaned back in his chair, surveying her carefully. "Well, that should be all. Please continue on to your first period class. If the teacher reprimands you for being late, you can refer them to me."

Charlie pressed her lips together in a thin line and grabbed hold of door handle, twisting it almost violently in her desperation to get the hell out of there. The door swung wide open and just as she was about to dart into the hallway she was forced to stop short. There was another figure blocking her exit. Allison. As soon as the girl saw Charlie, her eyebrows drew together in confusion. "Charlie? What're you doing her—"

"Ah, Allison," Grandpa Argent interjected, moving so he was standing right over Charlie's shoulder. "Good. You're here."

Allison glanced back and forth between Charlie and her grandfather a few times, her mouth opening and closing as she searched for words. After a few moments she blinked and shook her head, reordering her thoughts before turning focusing in on the white-haired man. "You, um, you were looking for me?" she stammered out.

"Yes, yes, come on in," he replied, waving at her to enter.

The two girls stepped forward and exchanged places on either side of the door, Charlie hopping out of the frying pan while Allison hopped into it. The two of them exchanged a look as they passed each other, Charlie silently mouthing the words 'good luck'. As soon as she made it into the hallway, she spun around and stared at the door to the principal's office as it closed behind Allison. For some reason she felt like it was happening in slow motion, ominous music playing in the background. She let out a quiet groan and pinched at the bridge of her nose in frustration. "Shit."

This was not good. Grandpa Argent calling her in that office had nothing to do with her Impala and everything to do with cornering her and prying information, and there was no doubt in her mind that Allison was going through the exact same thing. The only difference? He didn't have to use any of that subtlety with Allison. The meeting behind that door….it wasn't just going to be him trying to extract some sort of information from a basic if slightly pointed conversation. It wads going to be a full-on interrogation.

Swearing to herself, Charlie wrenched her eyes away from that ominous closed door and readjusted the strap of her bag on her shoulder before marching off down the hall. Jesus, this was a disaster. The cops, the Argents, the freaking school board now—there were just too many factors that needed accommodating. They needed to come up with a plan. Stat.

Charlie darted through the hallways, rounding the corner that led to Scott's locker. He was standing there, exchanging his books with an intense look on his face….It was either concentration of constipation—she couldn't quite tell. Charlie was just about to run up to him and start whispering frantically about how epically screwed they were, but she saw something out of the corner of her eye that made her hesitate. Another freaking camera.

After stopping for about half a second Charlie continued on in the hallway, directly past Scott and barely even acknowledging his presence. She couldn't run the risk of stopping and talking to him—not so soon after her discussion with Grandpa Argent. Maybe she was just being paranoid, but he was paying attention to her now. She wasn't going to give him any reasons to look closer. Instead she just walked straight past him, moving towards first period English class. She slid into her seat—she had taken the one behind Scott since he and Allison weren't allowed to associate anymore.

The first bell rang and the students began trickling in. Charlie waited in anticipation for Allison and Scott to show up, hoping that something in their faces would be able to tell her what the hell was going on. Allison came in first, her lips pressed together in a thin line and her expression grim. That was not good news. Catching sight of Charlie, Allison picked up her pace, sliding into the seat next to her. "Hey," Allison whispered, dropping her bag on the floor next to her. "You okay?"

"Yeah, I'm fine," Charlie whispered back, shaking her head a bit. "I mean, your grandfather is creepy as hell and frankly scares the crap out of me, but other than that I'm golden." Allison's eyes fell shut and she sank lower in her seat, making Charlie's stomach twist a bit. "What about you?" she demanded, nodding at the girl. "Are you okay?"

"I—I don't know," she stammered out. "He—he started asking me all these questions and he put his fingers to my neck like he was measuring my pulse to see if I was lying."

"Like I said," Charlie replied, waving her hand around a little. "Creepy."

Allison covered her face with her hands an exhaled sharply. "Did you see the cameras?"

"Um, yeah," Charlie said, nodding along with her words. "The oppressive signs of dictatorship are kind of hard to miss."

"What are we going to do?" Allison whispered. "My parents are watching me like hawks. They check my phone like twice a day now, and I'm pretty sure my mom's been going through my stuff. I'm just—I just keep trying to think of ways to help you guys, and they keep taking them away. If they find Jackson, I don't know what they're going to do with him."

Charlie ran her hands down her face as well, swearing for what felt like the thousandth time that morning. "Okay, if we're going to help Jackson we're going to have to figure out more about the kanima. But none of us can act like anything is off, because I'm pretty sure your grandfather is watching all of us at this point. I'll talk to Scott at lunch—try and come up with some sort of game plan. You're parents know he and I are friends. That can't be too suspicious. You and I can meet Stiles after school. He's got Jackson in a police transport van parked in the preserve and—"

"Wait, what?!" Allison hissed.

"Yeah, I know," Charlie shot back, raising a placating hand. "Terrible idea. The worst. But it's done, so we've gotta clean it up. We can't do anything while we're here, you especially. So the second we can get the hell out of here, I say we do it."

"Yeah," Allison said, nodding in agreement. "Yeah, of course, but Charlie—"

Before she could finish her thought, the second bell rang, signifying the beginning of class. The rest of the students surged into the classroom, Scott among them. Immediately Allison focused in on him. "Scott!" she hissed frantically, leaning in over her desk. "Scott!"

Scott turned around in his seat to look at her, the urgency in Allison's face making his forehead crease in confusion. But as soon as the Scott's name left her mouth, the front door to the classroom slammed shut dramatically, attracting all of their attention to the front of the room. Those heels clacking against the floor definitely didn't belong to Mr. Hobson. Charlie watched in terror as Mrs. Argent strolled into the classroom. Hell in high heels. Charlie felt her chest seize up and her hands clench into fists.

"I'm afraid your teacher was feeling ill today and had to leave early," she drawled out. "So unfortunately you're stuck with me as a substitute teacher." Her cold, sharp eyes scanned the room, but Charlie could see her hesitating on three faces. Scott's, Allison's, and her own. "So," Mrs. Argent continued cheerfully. "Who wants to catch me up? Mr. McCall?"

Great. Now not only did they have to deal with cops, kanimas, hunters, and teenage angst, but they also had to deal with a mountain of awkward family/romantic tension during first period. First freaking period. Literally the only thing good about school was that it provided a bit of a break from the drama. Now it didn't even do that. Charlie was calling it. School was officially useless to her. And also, what the hell happened to Mr. Hobson? Did they kill him? Seriously, couldn't they have at least picked Harris to get rid of?

English class was even more horrifying than ever. The way Mrs. Argent kept looking around, it was like she had X-ray vision or something. Like those cold blue eyes of hers could see straight into your soul, learn all your hopes, dreams and fears, and then use all of that information to brutally and systematically destroy you. Okay, there was a slim possibility that Charlie was over-reacting, but that's how it felt. And through the entire class Allison kept shooting her this look, like she desperately needed to tell her something but couldn't.

Finally first period ended. Charlie packed all her things like she usually would and strolled out of the classroom as casually as possible. As soon as she broke the threshold, though, she hung back, leaning against the lockers and waiting for Allison to follow. The girl followed soon after, the relief on her face probably mirroring the one on Charlie's as well. But Allison didn't make it more than half a step through the door before her mother's voice rang out, calling her back.

Crap.

Torture. That's what this was. Sheer, bloody torture. It was pretty freaking incredible that she was still getting decent grades, because she never seemed to be paying any attention during class at all. Every single second felt like a countdown to a bell, and it really sucked. And it really, really sucked when it was chemistry she was stuck in. When that bell finally rang, Charlie jumped out of her seat, making a beeline for Scott on her way out. "Hey," she whispered, making him jump a little in surprise.

"Ch—Charlie!" he stammered out, blinking at her. "You seriously need to stop sneaking up like that."

Charlie made a face at him. "Scott, you're a werewolf," she reminded him. "I'm not supposed to be able to sneak up on you."

"Yeah, well you walk like a freaking ninja," he mumbled.

"Look," Charlie hissed. "Just—just act normal. Casual conversation, okay? We don't want to look suspicious or anything on the cameras. Because apparently we're in a freaking Bond movie right now."

"What is going on?" Scott whined. "Why are they putting up cameras? I mean are they even allowed to do that?"

"I can't believe I'm going to say this," Charlie drawled out, keeping a neutral expression on her face, "but I think the Argents are actually the least of our problems at the moment."

"Seriously?"

"Well in case you hadn't noticed," she muttered back, "we seem to be in a bit of a predicament. I mean we have Jackson locked up in a freaking police van. I'm pretty sure that's not a permanent solution to our problem. We can keep his parents fooled for one day—maybe two—but the clock's running out, man."

Scott let out a quiet groan and rubbed absently at the back of his neck as the two of them trudged towards the cafeteria. "Yeah," he said, exhaling sharply. "I don't think we're gonna be walking away from this one."

"Dude, we were never going to come out of this unscathed," she replied, elbowing him in the side. "I was just hoping it would be slightly less unscathed than this." She squeezed her eyes shut for a moment and exhaled sharply. "Look, we need to fix this. If we can't keep Jackson locked up, then we need to fix him."

"Yeah, but how?" Scott demanded, shrugging. The two of them made their way through the cafeteria, winding through the tables until they got to the lunch line and grabbed a couple of trays before idly pushing their way through the lunch line. "I mean where do we even start?" Scott continued. "How exactly are we supposed to fix this?"

"Well first off we need to get that bestiary translated," Charlie replied, piling a ridiculously huge mountain of tater tots onto her plate.

"And how are we going to do that?" Scott demanded, grabbing a piece of pizza. "I don't think Google translate has an 'Archaic Latin' setting."

"Second of all," Charlie barreled on, opting to ignore Mr. Negativity, "we need to try and find out more about the kanima. If we really want to be able to fight the damn thing, we need to be able to understand it. Like why the hell would it go after Danny?"

"I don't know," Scott said, shrugging a bit. "I mean, Danny is Jackson's best friend."

"No, that's the thing," Charlie said, waving her tiny plastic spork in his face. "I've been thinking about it, and we've got to separate Jackson from the kanima. They're two completely different entities."

Scott frowned to himself and grabbed his tray and moved through the cafeteria until they found some free spots far enough from other students so that they could talk freely. Charlie began taking out a pile of textbooks, spreading them across the table so it might look like they were studying to any prying cameras. Taking her lead, Scott opened up his backpack and did the same. "Okay, what do you mean by that?" Scott murmured. "Two different entities?"

"Well Jackson clearly doesn't remember anything he does as the kanima, right?" Charlie said, collapsing into the plastic orange chair opposite him. "So maybe that means the kanima has its own motivations. Maybe the—"

"Maybe it's the kanima that wanted to hurt Danny and not Jackson," Scott finished. "Like…like multiple personalities. Maybe the kanima needed to protect itself from him or something."

"Exactly."

Scott took a giant bite of his pizza and nodded enthusiastically. "Okay," he mumbled through a mouthful of food. "I was gonna go to the hospital after school today to visit him and see what happened. I'll see if I can find anything out about why the kanima would want to go after him."

"Sounds like a plan to me," Charlie sighed out. Frowning to herself, she pushed her food around absently. That looming sense of dread was still hanging over her head. It was because she didn't understand yet. She kept trying to, but she felt like there was a piece of the puzzle missing. And she really wanted to find that goddamn piece. It was driving her more than slightly nuts.

All of the sudden a hand appeared in her plane of view, waving frantically. Charlie blinked herself out of her reverie and looked up from her plate to see Scott staring at her expectantly. "What's up?" she murmured.

"You okay?" he said, furrowing his eyebrows and nodding at her. "You're not eating your tater tots. That's weird."

"No, I'm fine," she muttered. "I was just thinking about something the murderous asshole was saying."

"You mean Derek?" Scott elaborated. "You're going to have to stop referring to him as 'the murderous asshole' at some point."

"No, I don't," she replied easily, glowering at Scott a little bit. "But I don't want to talk about the murderous asshole, just the thing he said."

Scott lifted his hands in the air in submission. "Fine. What did Derek—"

"Murderous asshole," she interjected.

Scott rolled his eyes at her a little bit before continuing. "Fine. What did the murderous asshole say?"

Charlie rolled her eyes slightly before continuing. "It was after Stiles and I got pinned down in the pool. The murderous asshole said that the kanima didn't recognize itself in the mirror. Jackson doesn't know he's the kanima—there's no sense of self. You know what that sounds like?" She looked at Scott expectantly, but he just made a confused puppy face and shrugged noncommittally in response. "It sounds like an identity crisis," Charlie barreled on. "Jackson is the king of identity crises. The whole 'being adopted' thing? That's why he's such a competitive jackass. He doesn't know who he is or where he came from, so he needs to be better than everybody else."

"Okay," Scott shot back, shaking his head a bit. "What's your point?"

"If the kanima lacks an identity, it lacks motivation," she replied. "If it doesn't have motivation, then why the hell is it killing the people it kills? Why is it going after Danny? Why is it doing anything? I just feel like we're missing something. Something really important."

Scott's hand flew to his face and he let out a quiet groan. "You're right. We need to get that passage translated. Like right now."

"Yup."

Charlie let out a despondent sigh and started digging into the mountain of tater tots. She had come to understand that supernatural crises and despondent sighing were usually a prelude to shoving as much food as she could in her mouth. Bonus points if that food had little to no nutritional value whatsoever. She was in the middle of playing 'how many tater tots can I fit into my mouth at the same time' when Scott cleared his throat lightly, making her look up at him. His face was pinched, like he was worried about something. That in itself wasn't that special—there was a lot to be worried about these days—but this was different. Scott wasn't wearing his 'confused puppy' face anymore. He was wearing his 'concerned puppy' face.

"Wha 're 'oo lookin' at?" she muttered defensively, spraying bits of tater tot across the table.

It was Scott's turn to sigh, those brown eyes getting all earnest. It kind of freaked her out. Sure 'concerned puppy' Scott was all adorable and stuff, but when that concern was directed to her, it just ended up making her feel super-uncomfortable. "I was just thinking about something Der—the murderous asshole said. You know, when we met him on the lacrosse field yesterday."

Charlie swallowed down the tater tots and shrugged. "What about it?"

The crease between Scott's eyebrows became more pronounced and he leaned over the table a bit. "H—he said that there were _three_ possibilities for the kanima. He said that you were one of them. That you told him something—something that happened to you? Did you say something to him?"

Charlie collapsed back in her seat, a small scowl pulling at her lips. "Yeah," she muttered evasively. "I did."

Scott blinked at her and shook his head a little bit. "So what did you say?" he asked quietly. "What's going on with you?"

Sinking a little further down in her seat, Charlie folded her arms across her chest. First Lydia and now Scott. Turns out today was going to be a day of confessions. Fan-freaking-tastic. Blowing out a long breath, she let her head fall back on her shoulders, staring up at the mildewing cork board ceiling—which was probably some sort of health code violation—and collected herself before looking down at Scott again. "You remember the night of the winter formal?"

"Yeah, I don't think I'll be forgetting that any time soon," Scott muttered back. "It's pretty much burned into my memory."

"Ha! Burned into your memory—nice one. You know because Peter got lit on—" The more than slightly judgmental look on Scott's face made Charlie stop short. Apparently she needed less colorful editorializing and more facts. "Anyways…." she continued awkwardly. "You remember how Allison and I were stuck in the house with Peter for a while?" Scott just nodded wordlessly. Charlie shifted uncomfortably in her seat before she continued. "He was sort of kind of going to turn me."

All of the sudden a loud gagging sound echoed in Charlie's ears. Scott began choking on his piece of pizza, coughing and spluttering loudly. Dude had freaking superpowers and he was going to be taken down by a piece of pizza. "What?" Scott finally managed force out. "He what?"

"Relax, it's not like he did—he didn't get a chance to," she replied with a forced casual tone, waving a hand around dismissively. "You and the murderous asshole body-slammed him before he got the chance. He just…..shoved his claws into the back of my neck, did a memory transfer thingy, and I now have hallucinations and his ghost is haunting my dreams. No biggy. Tater tot?"

The last sentence rushed out of her so quickly she wasn't sure she could actually understand the words, let alone Scott. Which was kind of the point of it, really. She was crossing her fingers. Scott just gaped at her, ignoring her offering of tater tots, so she immediately grabbed one of those little kid juice boxes they distributed and began to suck on the straw until the box was empty and the juice gurgled loudly, glancing to the left and right guiltily. Scott stared at her in shock for a few moments before shaking his head violently like he was trying to reboot his brain. "Wait, what?! How could you—When did you—What?! Why didn't you say anything?"

"I didn't think it was relevant," she said with a shrug.

"Not relevant?" Scott hissed. "Not relevant?! You're having hallucinations and we—"

"We had other stuff going on, okay?" she grumbled. "Lydia was missing and then the thing with Isaac and now…..We still have other stuff going on. Again, low priority."

"You could have asked for help!"

"Yes, I could have," she drawled out. "And I didn't. I chose not to. My head, my choice. As you can see, I am currently okay. And here we both are in the midst of an imminent crisis and a lot of other things to worry about."

Scott jutted out his chin and stabbed at his food with his fork. It was almost like he was sulking or something. At the very least he was lost in thought. He looked back up at her questioningly, opening and closing his mouth a bit. "Well…..does Stiles know?"

Charlie exhaled sharply and nodded. "Yeah, he knows. He's not exactly happy about it, but he knows. L—look, I'm dealing with it, okay? We've got other problems we need to focus on more. Maybe when all this shit is over we can fix my brain, but for now people are dying. Let's cross that off our to-do list first. Then we can cover my descent into madness once we find a terrarium where we can keep Jackson."

Scott's eyebrows pulled together in a confused frown. "Terrarium?"

"You know," she said, bobbing her head a bit. "One of those glass cage things where you can keep snakes and lizards and stuff. And, hey, Stiles said he used to have a boa. He can totally hook us up with some dead mice to feed Jackson when he gets all scaly." Immediately Scott's head sagged on his shoulders. Charlie almost thought he was upset about something, but then his shoulders began shaking and she realized he was just laughing. She reached across the table and flicked his ear, making him twitch in pain. "Dude, stop laughing. I'm being serious. Let's go put Jackson in a giant glass box at to zoo."

Scott just looked up at her, his face screwed into this weird expression that somehow managed to be equal parts amusement, gratitude, and sympathy. "I'm glad you're on our side."

Ugh. He just seemed so damn genuine. People needed to stop throwing genuine human emotion at her. She didn't know what to do with it. "Yeah, well I like to root for the under dogs," she drawled out, folding her arms across her chest and adopting that weirdly defensive posture she always seemed to default to. "Get it? Under dogs? 'Cause you're a—"

"Yeah, Charlie. I get it."

"Plus your side has Stiles," she mumbled under her breath. It was quiet enough that he shouldn't have heard her. If he was human that is. But he wasn't human, and somehow she kept freaking forgetting that. Goddamn werewolf hearing. Realizing her mistake, Charlie's eyes widened instinctively and snapped up to Scott's. And, of course, the floppy-haired wonder was grinning like a moron. "Hey!" Charlie snapped, pointing an accusing finger at him. "Hey, you shut the hell up right now!"

"Wha—I didn't say anything!" Scott protested, but the grin on his face didn't make him very convincing.

"Just because you've got crazy reflexes doesn't mean that I can't beat the crap out of you," she threatened. "You best watch yourself, McCall."

"Noted," Scott said, sarcastically holding his hands in the air in submission. "Really, I'm terrified."

Charlie narrowed her eyes at him dangerously, a sickly sweet smile covering her face, and sent a swift kick to his shin. Scott yelped loudly, making him glare at her accusatorially and making her smile turn genuine. "Yeah, that's what I thought," she said in a cheerful tone. "I'm not sure when you stopped being scared of me, but you best start again. Or I'm going to remind you why you were in the first place."

"Who says I was ever scared of you?"

Charlie smirked widely and quirked an eyebrow at him. "I might not be a human lie detector, Scott, but my basic observational skills are telling me that you're full of shit."

Scott just stared at her evenly and shrugged. "I do kind of have to go to the bathroom."

As Charlie remained stony-faced, the grin that had begun to pull at Scott's lips got wider and wider until it had pretty much taken over his face. He just looked so damn pleased with himself. It was a long, long time before she could bring herself to respond.

"You're a moron."

The lunch bell rang too soon. Once again, Charlie felt herself being chucked into the fiery pit of hell. Sure it usually felt that way, but this time more so than usual. The way she felt….it kind of reminded her of how she felt trapped in the pool that night. Desperately needing to be somewhere else, but unable to get there. Feeling absolutely useless, trapped, hamstrung by her need to obtain some sort of higher education. Kicking major werewolf/hunter/kanima ass should be optioned as a kind of independent study. Then again given the current administration, that probably wouldn't be allowed. Yet another reason that family sucked. Except for Allison, of course.

Throughout the day, Charlie couldn't help but feel like eyes were on her all the time. Every time she turned around the corner, there was a new camera staring at her. It as almost like they popped up all on their own. She had seen maybe two construction guys wandering around and putting them up, but there were dozens upon dozens. And it wasn't just the cameras. Every time she passed by the principal's office or English classroom, Allison's grandpa and mother would be staring at her—one of them looked cruel and the other looked just plain crazy. Charlie pretended not to notice their scrutiny. Hell, she even decided to stride by their rooms while pretending to gab on the phone, giggling hysterically. Neither of them knew her well enough to understand how ridiculous the image she was painting for them actually was. Anyways the point was that between the cameras in the hallways, the only place that was marginally private was the bathrooms and the locker rooms. The administration had opted not to put cameras there. Legally speaking something like that probably strayed a little too close to child pornography.

And that's where Allison found Charlie. The bathroom.

When the end-of-day bell rang, Charlie grabbed her bag and hauled ass towards the bathroom. She and Allison were supposed to be in the car and on the way to the preserve in less than five minutes, and her bladder felt like it was about to explode like an over-filled water balloon. She ran down the hallway like a kid who had drunk way too much soda during their favorite movie and held out till the very end, even though they felt like they might die. Damn it, the metaphors were sneaking up on her again. The point was that she ran to the bathroom and as soon as she opened the door she was faced with an very desperate Allison. The look on the girl's face….Charlie was grateful she had just gone to the bathroom otherwise there was a very high likelihood that she might pee herself.

"What's that look on your face?" she said, pushing past Allison to get to the sinks. "I don't like that look on your face, Allison. You take that look off your face right now."

Allison followed Charlie to the sinks, failing to change hr facial expression as Charlie had so requested. "We're in big trouble," Allison hissed into her ear. "I mean really big."

"I know that," Charlie replied with a casualness she didn't feel in the slightest. "And you know how I know that? The look on your face. How can you survive living with your parents when you freaking face reads like an entry in your diary."

"I don't keep a diary."

"Not the point!" Charlie shut off the tap a little more violently than was probably necessary and turned to Allison, her eyebrows impatiently. "So what happened?"

Allison glanced right and left, making sure nobody was listening in before leaning towards Charlie. "They know about Jackson," Allison whispered harshly. "They know that he's missing."

"So your family knows he's not at school," Charlie said with a shrug. "Your creepy-ass grandfather told me that this morning. That's not exactly the end of the world. He could be sick or he could be cutting class or—"

"No, you don't understand!" Allison growled quietly. "They don't just know that Jackson missed school. They know that he's missing. Like _officially_ missing. In the legal sense."

Cold fear suddenly flooded through Charlie's veins, turning her insides to ice. Her jaw twitched violently and her next words came out in short, halting sentences. "Allison," she said, enunciating the words carefully. "By missing 'in the legal sense', are you saying that the cops know about Jackson?"

Allison let out a shaky breath before nodding hesitantly. "Yeah. He told me this morning,"

"THIS MORNING?!" Charlie's shriek was so loud it filled the bathroom. And probably tore through the hallways of the majority of Beacon Hills High School. And this was probably the moment in the TV show where her voice echoed and the camera kept panning out from the bathroom, to the school, to the town, and then finally settling on an image of the globe with her voice superimposed over it. Yeah, it was loud. But Charlie didn't care. She was too busy staring at Allison in complete disbelief. "Seriously, Allison, how can you have not told me about this yet?"

"I didn't get the chance, okay?" she hissed. "My family is here, and you were with Scott at lunch!"

Charlie swore loudly and ran towards the door, shoving it violently to get out. As soon as that door swung open, though, she was forced to stop short. Directly in front of her, pointed in her direction, was yet another one of those creepy ass cameras. By the time Allison appeared at her shoulder, she had put up the front and was smiling casually. "Hey, Allison," she said, acting as normal as possible. "Would you mind giving me a ride? My car's not working and I'd love not to have to take the bus."

Allison blinked, surprised by the abrupt shift in Charlie's demeanor. "Um, yeah," she mumbled, nodding a bit. "Yeah, sure."

"Great!" Charlie chirped. She linked her arm through Allison's and began marching down the hallway, half-dragging Allison along with her.

Once out of the school, the two girls practically ran to Allison's Toyota and jumped in. They may or may not have left tire marks on the ground as they screeched out of parking lot. Neither of them spoke a single word until they had left the parking lot far behind. Which didn't take very long. Allison was playing it fast and loose when it came to the speed limits. "Okay," Charlie said, still breathless either from the run to the car or the waves of panic she was trying to stave off. "So the cops know about Stiles. Have you called him and told him yet?"

"I couldn't," was Allison's quiet reply.

"What do you mean you couldn't?!" Charlie spluttered. She held up her hand and began to mime punching buttons on a phone. "'Oh, hello Stiles. You best ditch Jackson's phone and get the hell out of there because the cops might be tracking you down.' How hard is that?!"

"When my mom stopped me after English class she asked me about the number of calls I was making to Stiles," Allison shot back. "She threatened Scott."

Charlie sank lower in her seat and drew her knees up until her feet were resting on the dash, curling up as much as possible. "Man," she muttered to herself. "You're mom literally wants to kill your boyfriend. You've got more parental issues than do and I have a dead dad and a mom who abandoned me at birth."

The look she received from Allison was a weird combination of affronted and sympathetic. Before she had the chance to say anything, Charlie just waved her off and grabbed her own phone, quickly dialing Stiles's number and pressing it to her ear as it rang. But it didn't ring. It didn't ring at all. Straight to freaking voice mail. Charlie let out a strangled cry of frustration and wrapped her hand tight around her phone, slamming her fist to her forehead. "His phone is dead. We've got no way to contact him."

Allison glanced at Charlie out of the corner of her eye. Even with that one fleeting look Charlie could tell that they were wide with abject terror. "We need to find him. Right now."

"Scott told me where they were at lunch," Charlie replied. "You want to go in through the main entry, then take the third dirt road on the left until we get to this lake. After that we're going to have to off road it for a little ways. They're at the top of the hill near that lake."

Swallowing heavily, Allison nodded and stared out in front of her at the road ahead. The trees were whizzing by at an alarming rate, but Charlie found her eyes continuously trailing back to the clock. Each minute that ticked by made her stomach twist a little more. She felt like a rubber band that was slowly being pulled tighter and tighter. Pretty soon she was going to snap.

"Can you please go faster?!" Charlie demanded, waving her hands frantically.

"I'm going fifteen miles over the speed limit!" Allison shot back.

Charlie exhaled sharply and began shaking her head almost pathologically. "Well then go twenty! The number of unsolved murders around here? The cops have a lot of bigger stuff to deal with. Chief among it, arresting all of us for kidnapping! Now pedal to the metal!"

Allison let out a frustrated sigh, but her foot pressed down on the accelerator just a little bit more, sending the lot of them hurtling down the road. It wasn't that much longer before they managed to make it to the preserve. Unfortunately that meant slowing down. According to Allison driving through a heavily wooded area covered in dead leaves that offered very little traction at fifty miles per hour was 'not advisable'. And it apparently Charlie drumming her fingers constantly didn't help either.

Finally, after mowing down more than a little of the local shrubbery, the two of them managed to find that damn lake Scott was talking about and took a right, slowly going up the slope of the hill. Just sitting in her seat like that, Charlie felt like she might explode. She needed to get out. She needed to move. And it was then that she caught sight of the sun glinting off something blue in the distance. Squinting into the sun, the shape of two cars became clear—Stiles's Jeep and some white van—and she began to unbuckle her seatbelt. "Stop here," she ordered. "It'll be faster on foot and we have to drive back down anyway."

It was a good thing Allison listened and slowed to a stop, because Charlie was seriously considering throwing herself out of the moving car. As soon as the car stopped, Charlie exploded out of the passenger side door and began sprinting up the hill. The dramatic tension of the moment was slightly lessened, though, when she slipped on some of those fallen leaves and face-planted in the dirt. "Damn it," she hissed, brushing off her clothes as she continued to run. "Today was not the right day to wear a freaking dress."

After Allison caught up with her, the two of them strode into the clearing where the cars were parked. It seemed oddly quiet—almost unnervingly quiet. It was the type of quiet that made you want to be quiet too, like shattering the perfectly still silence would be some sort of transgression. The two girls circled the cars, and as they made their way around the van they found Stiles leaning against the side, his back to them and his eyes trained carefully on a phone. "Hey!" Charlie whispered harshly.

At the sound of her voice Stiles jumped, flailing violently and almost collapsing to the ground. "Argh! O—oh my God!"

"They know," Allison declared before anybody had the chance to say anything.

Stiles blinked at her in confusion. "What?!"

"About Jackson," Charlie filled in. "They know Jackson's missing. And that meant that we have to leave. Right now."

"No, they can't," Stiles said, waving what was presumably Jackson's phone around. "I've been texting his parents since last night. They don't have a clue."

"Give me that." Charlie snatched the phone out of his hand and chucked it as far away from them as possible. It landed with a quiet thump, somewhere in the leaves. When she turned back to face the other two Stiles was staring at her with a highly scandalized expression. "Wha—why would you do that?!" he whined pathetically. "I was developing a narrative! There was an arc!"

"Oh," Charlie trilled, raising her eyebrows at him. "Was there character development?"

"Yes!" Stiles exclaimed loudly, and probably sarcastically. "There was! A whole freaking bunch of character development!"

"Well then of course they could tell the texts were fake! Jackson doesn't develop! He is a fixed point—the eternal Jackass!"

"Look!" Allison interjected harshly, enunciating each word like she was talking to a child. Which, to be honest, was sometimes necessary for both her and Stiles. "My grandfather told me his parents went to the police," she continued. "They know."

Stiles's eyes darted back and forth between Charlie and Allison, his disbelief slowly morphing into full on panic. "W—why didn't one of you guys call me?!"

"Because you're phone is dead, you idiot!" Charlie hissed back.

That information only seemed to confound Stiles even more. He reached into his pocket and pulled out his phone, only to be met with a very black screen. He started frantically pushing random buttons like he expected it to suddenly come to life. Finally he gave up, shoving it back in his pocket with an angry grunt. "How is my phone dead and Jackson's isn't?"

Charlie just planted her hands on her hips and narrows her eyes at him. "How many games of Candy Crush have you played today?"

Stiles stared blankly at them for a few moments before speaking again. "Guys, I know why my phone died."

"Look, we have to go!" Allison snapped, forcing everybody to focus. "Now!"

Stiles froze for a solid two and a half seconds before the next spazz attack. He flailed around, pretty much running into the van before stumbling towards the passenger seat. Once he opened the door he lunged inside and snatched up the police scanner installed in the dash. Charlie darted forwards, leaning over his shoulder as the staticky words echoed from the speakers.

"_All available units proceed to Beacon Hills Preserve as instructed. Proceed with caution until Sheriff Stilinski's arrival. Repeat—proceed with caution._"

Stiles opened his mouth to say something, but all that came out was this weird noise that somehow managed to be guttural and high-pitched at the same time. He threw down the receiver and took a step back, covering his mouth with his hand. All of the sudden he pointed at the thing violently. "That is not good. That is very, very not good. That is bad is what that is. Freaking catastrophic! Wha—what are we—"

"Stiles," Charlie said loudly, interrupting his descent into panic. "Is there anywhere else we can take Jackson? And I mean anywhere."

Stiles's face scrunched up into an expression of extreme concentration and then he nodded. "Yeah, I know a place."

"Where is it?"

Stiles exhaled sharply and made a face. "Somewhere very far from this. But—"

"Then we're going," Allison said definitively. "Charlie and I will follow you."

Charlie reached into her bag and tossed Stiles her phone. "Here. Call Scott. Give him the new location."

Catching her phone easily, Stiles nodded to himself. "Right." He suddenly seemed to spring into action. He reached into his back pocket and yanked something out, tossing it at Charlie. She caught whatever the hell it was, but was so flustered it took her a few moments to ever realize that she was holding a set of keys. "Okay," Stiles announced. "So I'll take the van, Allison you take your car, and Charlie'll take the Jeep."

At that, Charlie had to shake her head a bit to reorder her thoughts. Of all the things she had seen and heard over the past few months, that was easily the most ridiculous. "I'm taking the Jeep?"

"Um, yeah," Stiles said like it was the most obvious thing in the world. "The cops are on their way here. Leaving the Jeep might give a hint as to who was involved with the freaking kidnapping."

"But you're letting me drive the Jeep? Stiles, that's insane. I'll take the van."

Stiles held up a hand, waving at her to stop talking. "Wha—no. No, okay? You know what insane is? Insane is letting my girlfriend drive around with a homicidal lizard man in the freaking trunk. Plus, you let me drive the Impala that time."

"Because I was experiencing acute blood loss at the time," Charlie protested, tossing the keys back at him. "There really wasn't much of a choice."

Stiles caught the keys easily, but as soon as they were in his hand he strode forwards and grabbed hers. It was balled up into a fist, but he pried each of her fingers back until he could force the keys into her open palm. Looking at her meaningfully, he closed her fingers around the keys again. "Just drive the car."

"Guys, we don't have time to argue about this!" Allison exclaimed. "Everybody just get in a car and let's go!"

Charlie let out a strangled cry of frustration, but did as she was told and dashed towards the Jeep. As she approached it she had to remind herself not to head to the passenger's side. Her brain was kind of wired to head in that direction. Climbing into the driver's seat felt weird. Like there was something fundamentally wrong with the situation. Scrunching up her face into a weird wince, she shoved the keys into the ignition and twisted it carefully, like she was afraid she was going to break it or something.

Within a span of fifteen seconds, all three cars roared to life. Stiles and the prison transport van pulled out of the clearing first, followed by Charlie in the Jeep, and finally Allison formed the last member of their bizarre little caravan. Charlie's heart was beating so fast she could feel it thrumming in her chest. The panic subsided slightly when they made it onto the actual paved roads, but her stomach stayed twisted in a feeling of prolonged discomfort, even when they had left the preserve long behind. All of this—everything that was happening right now—it left her with one, giant, terrifying question.

Were they treading water or were they drowning?

She honestly couldn't tell.

**Alright, so that's it! Please review! I have been having the absolute shittest time at work and could do with some cheering. Plus the movie I'm working on is wrapping, so I have to go find a new way to pay for food and shelter. Fun.**

**And here are two soundtracks here since I didn't get the last one together before I published the chapter.**

**Chapter 21 Soundtrack:**

**Charlie and Stiles bicker over the phone about his idiotic plan.**

**-~-~-~-~-~-~The Chase – The History of Panic.**

**Charlie talks to Mel and talks with her about Finstock.**

**-~-~-~-~-~-~Soon – Late Night Howl**

**Charlie goes to talk to Lydia.**

**-~-~-~-~-~-~Bug In A Web – CALLmeKAT**

**The car ride to school.**

**-~-~-~-~-~-~Run Along, Son – Husbands**

**Charlie and Lydia walking into school and seeing Isaac.**

**-~-~-~-~-~-~Indian Summer – How Sad**

**Charlie talks/fights with Isaac.**

**-~-~-~-~-~-~Claustrophobia – Choir of Young Believers.**

**Grandpa Argent invites Charlie to his office. End chapter.**

**-~-~-~-~-~-~Today We're Believers – Royal Canoe (I seriously love this one, guys)**

**Chapter 22 Soundtrack:**

**Charlie in the office with Grandpa Argent.**

**-~-~-~-~-~-~Lonely Life – AM and Shawn Lee**

**Charlie and Scott go through the lunch line and talk.**

**-~-~-~-~-~-~John Lennon – Sweatshop Union (this might not be the perfect place for this song, but I'm so desperate to use it! It might be one of my all-time favorite songs and I'm not even that particularly fond of rap. The lyrics are just….wow. You should listed to this and their song 'Makeshift Kingdom' which I will invariably be using at some point)**

**Allison and Charlie drive to find Stiles at the Preserve.**

**-~-~-~-~-~-~And the Sun Goes Down – A Rainmaker**

**The caravan leaves. Charlie panics. End chapter.**

**-~-~-~-~-~-~Down Under, Mining – Dear Reader**


	23. Co-Dependent

**Disclaimer: 'Teen Wolf' isn't mine. Shocking, right? But it's true. If there are any similarities in content or dialogue, it has probably originated with the show.**

**A huge thank you to meels234, Valkyrie101, kickarseanime, WinchesterDixonBros, etro13, Guest, Iste, L. , KEZZ 1, katiesgotagun, DraxThePacifist, Daenerys86, TheHallow, Exhuberance of Youth, Gee Brittany, zvc56, Female Whovian, Guest, and RK13 for reviewing! You guys are just the best.**

**Chapter 23 – Co-Dependent**

Apparently when Stiles said 'somewhere really far from here' he seriously meant it. She had said it before and she would say in again—everything in Beacon Hills seemed to be twenty minute drive. This one was double that—possibly more. It kind of freaked Charlie out—not knowing where she was going. But Stiles was trusting her with the Jeep. She could trust him with this. Maybe. She had to admit she began to lose faith a bit once they got back in the forest—it kind of seemed like they were driving in circles as the sun sank lower and lower into the sky, threatening to disappear completely beneath the horizon.

The Jeep. That was what was bothering her. Stiles had let her drive the Jeep. On the surface it was such a simple thing, but Charlie couldn't help but feel like it was something a bit heavier than that. Stiles loved his Jeep about as much as someone could love any inanimate object, and he was putting it in her care. Maybe it was a gesture of trust or something? Charlie wasn't sure why, but that made her squirm in her seat a bit. She should be grateful, right? Stiles letting her drive was a good thing, wasn't it? Probably. Definitely. But somewhere in the back of her warped little mind that thought was giving her a certain level of anxiety. And then there was the other bit. It wasn't until the odometer had clocked three additional miles that she realized Stiles had just called her his girlfriend. He had said it out loud and all official-like. That was a first. And here she was, driving a freaking symbol of her relationship. That wasn't unnerving at all.

Finally, they came to a stop. The woods were almost impossibly quiet. That was the first thing that occurred to Charlie as she stepped out of the car. It seemed like Stiles had picked the perfect spot—secret, secluded, far away from the prying eyes of, well, anyone. They were on the edge of a cliff face overlooking the center of the town. The sight of all those lights so small and so far away made her feel a little bit safe. In a weird way it felt like she was staring down at stars. They were separate, aloof, independent of all the crap going on down there. They were alone in the woods. But then something occurred to her. Forests weren't supposed to be that quiet. They were supposed to be filled with birds and furry woodland creatures. Those didn't seem to be around much anymore. Something had scared them away. Three guesses what.

Scott showed up not long after them on a freaking bicycle. The dude could pedal, she had to give him that much. It was actually kind of strange having him there. It was first time in weeks that the four of them had actually been able to be around each other and be...still. Or at least something slightly resembling it. Come to think of it the only time they had only been in the same spot at the same time twice since winter formal, and both times it had been because Lydia was in imminent danger. At least this time the danger was slightly less imminent.

"So what did Danny say?" Charlie asked urgently as the four of them grouped into a circle. "Is there any reason Jackson would want to go after him."

Scott let out a heavy sigh and shook his head. "No. There's no reason _Jackson _would want to go after him."

"Wait—hold up," Stiles interjected, holding up a hand. "What do you mean there's no reason _Jackson _would go after him."

"It's like you said at lunch, Charlie," Scott said, inclining his head in Charlie's direction. "You know, with the whole split personalities thing. There's no reason Jackson would want to go after him, but there is a reason the kanima would."

"What does that mean?" Allison whispered quietly.

"Apparently Jackson filmed himself of the first full moon after he got bitten," Scott replied. "He wanted to film himself changing."

"Of course he did," Charlie drawled out sarcastically. "Freaking narcissist."

"Okay, hold on a second," Stiles interjected. "If Jackson filmed himself changing, then why can't we convince him that he's the kanima? We just show him the tape."

"But that's the thing!" Scott insisted. "Someone looped the video. They cut out the bit with him changing. That's what Danny was doing for him. He was recovering what was cut out of the video."

"So that's why the kanima went after him," Charlie said, nodding along as understanding began to dawn on her. "It's protecting itself. It wants to stay anonymous."

"Did Danny manage to recover the footage?" Allison asked.

Scott's jaw twitched violently and he scratched at the back of his neck. "Yeah. Yeah, he did. It's on his tablet."

"So we get the footage, we show it to Jackson, and he knows he's a terrifying hell monster!" Stiles exclaimed, sounding just a little too happy about the prospect of convincing Jackson he was a murderer. "That sounds simple enough. Job done!"

At that point a crease formed between Scott's eyebrows, a look which indicated that the job was very, very far from being done. "Danny told me he left the tablet in the trunk of his car, which he left at the club."

"Well, alright," Stiles said, shrugging a bit. "So we go down to the club and get it."

"Dude, I already went to the club," Scott shot back. "Somebody broke into Danny's car, and guess what they took."

Stiles swore heavily and kicked at the dead leaves beneath his feet. "The tablet."

"Yeah," Scott mumbled. "And if Jackson doesn't remember being the kanima he's definitely not going to remember stealing Danny's tablet."

Stiles let out a loud groan and rolled his eyes so heavily, his entire head seemed to move with them. "Why would he steal the thing if he doesn't even know what's on it?"

"What if someone else took it?" Allison demanded.

Charlie nodded along with Allison's words, the gears in her head beginning to turn. "Yeah," she whispered to herself, her eyebrows furrowed in concentration. "Yeah," she repeated, this time in a stronger voice. "Someone else had to take it. Danny had the tablet last night when he went to the club, right?"

"Right," Scott agreed tentatively, not sure where she was going with this line of thought.

"Well if he took it, then where the hell did he put it?" Charlie said, throwing her hands in the air. "I distinctly remember finding him horrifyingly naked. Where exactly would he have put it?"

"Maybe he destroyed it," Scott argued. "Maybe he ditched it."

"Who looped the video in the first place?!" Charlie shot back, raising her eyebrows at him. "It wasn't Jackson. It wasn't Danny. And I'm pretty sure the kanima can't operate a camera given the whole razor-sharp claws situation. Maybe the person who looped it is the person who stole it."

"O—okay, hold on a second," Stiles said holding up both his hands and making the signal for a 'time out'. "If someone else took it, that means someone else knows he's the kanima."

Suddenly Scott looked up with an expression of realization on his face. "Which could mean somebody's protecting him!"

"The bestiary says the kanima seeks a friend, right?" Allison added.

"Oh, well that's just great," Charlie muttered, her voice dripping with sarcasm. "So the kanima has a BFF. That's just fantastic."

Stiles's face began to contort into an expression of extreme confusion. "Okay, hold on," he said, trying to pick apart all the new information. "So somebody watches Jackson make a video of himself turning into the kanima and then just erases part of it so he wouldn't know?"

"That's some excellent nutshelling, Stiles," Charlie sighed out. "The question is, who would do that?"

"Somebody who wanted to protect him?" Allison posited weakly.

Charlie blew out a long breath and shoved her hands in her pockets. That didn't make any kind of sense. Sure people would get protective over their pets and stuff, but a man-sized lizard that paralyzed people? That wasn't a pet. That wasn't something that you could care about. It was a weapon. And weapons got used. Throwing another person into this mess along with their own motivations and agendas seriously changed the landscape.

"Hold on a second," Scott said, his voice breaking in through her reverie. "There's something else. You two said that the only thing you found online about the kanima was that it went after murderers." Stiles and Charlie just nodded blandly in agreement. Scott looked back and forth between them expectantly. "What if that's actually true?"

"Wha—no," Stiles said, shaking his head. "It can't be. It tried to kill all of us, remember? I don't know about you guys, but I haven't murdered anybody lately."

"Yeah," Charlie threw in. "Wikipedia can't always be trusted."

"Hey!" Stiles growled, pointing an accusatory finger in her face. "Stop it with your casting aspersions!

"Casting aspersions?" Charlie deadpanned. "Really?"

"I—I am better than Wikipedia!"

As they bickered Scott got this far-away look on his face, like he was replaying all of the events from the past few weeks in his mind. "Well I—I don't think it was actually trying to kill us," Scott protested. He turned to Allison, his eyebrows raised. "Remember when we were at Isaac's the first time? It just went right by us, didn't it?"

Allison nodded slowly. "You're right. It just ran off."

"And it didn't kill you in the mechanic's garage," Scott barreled on, turning back to face Stiles.

"Yeah," Stiles agreed, still looking highly doubtful. "But it tried to kill me, Charlie, and Derek in the pool."

"Did it?" Scott questioned.

"It would've," Stiles protested. "It was waiting for us to come out."

Scott's eyes began to dart back and forth, like he was skimming the page of a book. A look of realization spread across his face and he widened his eyes meaningfully. "What if it was trying to keep you in?"

At that, Charlie felt her eyes fall shut. Here it was. That gnawing sensation of doubt and fear that had been building in the pit of her stomach was now justified. She had been afraid of this—that they were missing a part of the puzzle. A big, glaring piece that was about to screw up everything they thought they knew. And here it was. Jackson wasn't controlling the kanima. The kanima wasn't just acting out of self-preservation and lashing out blindly. There was another hand in this, guiding everything. None of this was random—it was all very, very deliberate.

"Ugh—why do I feel so violated all of the sudden?" Stiles demanded, shivering a bit.

"Because someone has been manipulating us this whole time," Charlie deadpanned.

Stiles snapped his fingers and pointed at her eagerly. "That's probably it."

"There's something else going on," Scott murmured pensively. "We don't know what it is. We don't know anything about Jackson or why somebody's protecting him."

"Know thy enemy."

Allison said the words so quietly Charlie almost didn't hear them. She, Stiles, and Scott all turned to face her, each of them wearing a questioning look. Upon seeing all of them looking at her, she shook her head dismissively. "It's just something my grandfather said."

"Tsan Tzu's 'Art of War'," Charlie drawled out. "Nice of him to bring it up now that we know absolutely nothing about our enemy. We don't know how the kanima works or who's controlling it or—"

She was cut off when Stiles clapped his hands together loudly. "Alright, I got it!" he exclaimed with a goofy, insincere grin, throwing his arms wide open to give it a little fanfare. "Kill Jackson. Problem solved."

Charlie rolled her eyes heavily and smacked him in the chest. "As appealing as that sounds, I'd rather not graduate to murder this early in my high school career." She wrapped her arms around her waist and bounced up and down on the balls of her feet, trying to guard against the cold. "Maybe we could just smack him around a bit, you know?" she proposed. "Scott could bust out his 'grrr' face and put the fear of God in him. The last time you did that the guy almost peed himself. I would really love for you to make Jackson pee himself."

"Alright," Stiles replied, bobbing his head along with his words. "Let's call that Plan B."

"Stiles, there can be no Plan B when Plan A is to kill him."

"I know," Stiles drawled out, seeming immensely pleased with himself.

Scott stared at the two of the in disbelief. "He risked his life for us," Scott reminded them. "Against Peter, you remember that?"

"But what did we just find out?" Stiles countered, waving his hands around a bit. "He got the bite from Derek. It's funny how he got exactly what he wanted by _supposedly_ risking his life for us. It's funny."

Charlie let out a long sigh and shrugged. "So Jackson is an opportunistic dick," she muttered. "It's not like that's news."

"That doesn't mean he's not still worth saving," Scott insisted.

"Look, I'm not here to bargain for the shriveled up husk that is Jackson's soul," Charlie replied. "I'm not saying we kill the guy, but let's not forget about the fact that he's killed three people. That we know of."

Scott's head snapped in her direction and he fixed her with that wide-eyed puppy dog look. "He doesn't know what he's doing!"

"So what?!" Charlie and Stiles said pretty much in unison.

"So I didn't either," Scott exclaimed, his voice halting. She and Stiles must have looked less than convinced, because he groaned in frustration and turned towards Allison. "Do you remember that time I almost killed you and Jackson?" he demanded. After she nodded quietly he rounded on Stiles and Charlie. "I had someone to stop me. He has nobody!"

Charlie let her eyes fall shut and her head sagged on her shoulders. It was true. Jackson didn't have anyone. He was isolated and alone. And she should probably feel the same things Scott did—sympathy, pity, maybe even a little responsibility for what he had been dragged into. But that was the thing. She didn't feel sorry for him. But by some ridiculous twist of fate, he ended up with people who cared about him. And she did feel for those people.

Stiles let out a scoff and shook his head. "That's his own fault."

"He's not wrong," Charlie added. "I mean I bet the murderous asshole offered to help him with the shifting and Jackson sent him packing."

"The murderous asshole?" Stiles queried, scrunching up his face in confusion.

"She's talking about Derek," Scott muttered, shaking his head. "Look, guys, this is Jackson. If we can save him, we have to try."

Again, Charlie had to hang her head and she wasn't sure if it was out of exasperation or out of shame. On one hand she kind of wanted to throttle Scott. His need to protect everybody at his and his friends' expense, regardless of how much of a dick they were, tended to be infuriating. To her sticking your neck out for someone who wouldn't shoot you with a water gun if you were dying of thirst just didn't make much sense. But Scott had to go and be righteous. He was a good person—probably one of the best people she had ever met. Which meant that she knew exactly where she was failing. Stupid Scott and his stupid conscience. How was it that he always ended up making them do the right thing? Charlie was more used to doing the easy thing. Maybe this meant she was growing up.

The four of them fell in to a tense silence, all studying each others' faces to gauge their reactions. No words had to be spoken between them, they had already settled on what they were doing. They were going to save Jackson. And what did saving Jackson involve? Babysitting. A lot of babysitting. Fan-freaking-tastic.

Resigning themselves to having to deal with the scaly jackass in the van, the four of them sat down and began tossing out ideas as to how to deal with said jackass. None of them were good. They got nowhere—no progress at all. The only indication that any time had passed at all was the sun sinking beneath the tips of the trees and Scott and Allison gradually moving closer and closer together. As the light faded, Charlie dragged Stiles to the Jeep under the excuse of 'getting dinner', but they both knew why they were really leaving. They were giving Scott and Allison some alone time—something neither of them got very often these days.

Being back in the passenger's seat of Stiles's Jeep was kind of a relief. It felt like everything was back to normal, her head resting against the cool window as the car rattled slightly beneath her. All was as it should be. The person who owned the car drove the car and the other one got to ride shot gun and make rambling commentary. The subject of the night? Curly fries.

"I mean what is it exactly that makes these things so delicious?" Stiles demanded, his mouth already filled with little chunks of fried potato. They had ended up ordering pretty much half the drive-through menu at Toby's including an impossible number of curly fries. In fact, when the two of them had rolled up to the window to pay, the cashier had seemed pretty alarmed that there were only two of them sitting in the car. But what could they say? Battling menacing supernatural forces was hungry work.

Stiles grabbed another handful of fries. Charlie was pretty sure he was shoving more of them in his mouth before he even managed to swallow the first ones. She really couldn't make up her mind as to whether it was impressive or gross. He held up a curly fry, inspecting it for a moment with a weird sort of reverence. "I mean it's an art form, really," he said, getting more excited than anybody should be about curly fries. "How do they get them to curl up like that? It's...it's like the perfect food."

Charlie let out a snort, trying and failing to keep the smile from tugging at her lips. "Yeah, Stiles, it's the perfect food. Except for, you know, the whole 'nutritional content' thing."

"Please. Since when have you cared about nutritional content? You once told me, verbatim I might add, 'if it's not covered in cheese, it's not worth eating.'"

"I don't remember that."

"You said that you like your bacon wrapped in bacon."

"I don't remember that either."

"You said that salads are just bowls filled with parental guilt."

Charlie chuckled a bit at that one, nodding along with the words. "I do remember that one," she laughed. "I stand by that." Stiles rolled his eyes at her and reached over for yet another handful of fries, only to have it smacked away. He let out a scandalized yelp and stared at her accusingly, but she just stared back evenly. "What?" she chirped. "You're going to eat all the fries before we get back."

"So?"

"So, we need to save some for Allison and Scott," she replied, smacking his hand away for a second time. "This is the closest thing they've had to a date in like...months. You are not going to ruin that by eating all the fries."

"They don't appreciate them as much as I do!" Charlie just smiled back and took a fry for herself, tossing it in her mouth. Apparently Stiles didn't appreciate that, taking the opportunity to gape widely at her. "Hey—you just said not to eat any!"

Charlie's smile widened a bit and she shrugged primly, making Stiles mutter to himself unintelligibly. She was pretty sure she heard the word 'double standards' thrown in there.

After that the conversation lapsed. Charlie found herself staring out the window of the Jeep and picking at the label of her soda bottle. It was a nervous habit—she didn't even realize she was doing it usually. But her dad had pointed it out to her a while ago. She would always do that when something was weighing on her. He would walk up to her, see the little bits of paper strewn across the table or desk, sigh and say, '_what is it?_'. And if she didn't tell him immediately, he would sit there and throw those little bits of paper at her face until she did. The whole ordeal made her pretty self-aware when it came to her nervous tendencies.

"I told Lydia," Charlie blurted out.

All of the sudden Stiles's head snapped around to stare at her accusingly. "Excuse me? You told her? What did you tell her? That is super-vague and anxiety provoking! You didn't—"

"I told her about me," Charlie interrupted, heading off the panic spiral Stiles was about to throw himself into. It didn't seem to work though.

"You care to elaborate on that a little?!" he spluttered. "'I told her about me' is barely any less vague than 'I told Lydia'!"

"I told her about the attack—about my attack," Charlie half-shouted, trying to keep her voice audible above Stiles's mild hysteria. "I told her about the...after effects."

"You told her about the thirty-something werewolf living in your subconscious?" Stiles demanded. "Charlie, I that we—that all of us decided that telling Lydia about all the supernatural crap was not a good idea! I'm pretty sure we went as far as to say that it was a _bad_ idea! A very, very bad idea!"

Charlie sighed and ran her hands down her face. "I was a little less descriptive than that," she muttered. "I might have steered her more towards the idea that I'm suffering from some type of PTSD. Nightmares, anxiety, that sort of stuff. All pretty normal. Relatively speaking."

"Yeah, but why risk it?" Stiles demanded. "Why open that door when her kanima ex-boyfriend and a pack of disgruntled werewolves are on the other side?"

Charlie sighed and continued to peel at the label of her Coke. "She's lonely, Stiles," Charlie said, her tone low and entreating. "Being lonely is bad enough when you're _alone_. Lydia? These days she's been lonely when she's around us. She's lonely when she's around her friends. Do you have any idea how unbelievably shitty that feels?" At that Stiles's face lost some of its panicked disbelief and softened into a more contemplative expression. "Look," Charlie continued. "I'm not trying to out us or whatever, but Lydia is my best friend and all of us just keep bailing on her. She deserves better than what she's gotten. And she still deserves better than I gave her, but I had to give her...something."

Stiles's twitchiness faded away—that is it faded away as much as it could for him—and he stared out of the windshield. Comparably speaking, he was actually pretty still. His face seemed more than a bit forlorn, actually. He lifted up a hand and rubbed at his eyes for a moment before letting out a low groan. "You're right," he agreed. "We haven't been there for her the way we should. None of us." His face screwed up into an unreadable expression and he glanced at her out of the corner of his eye. "Do you think...Um, do you think I should apologize to her? The night the kanima trapped us in the pool she was all sad and crying in her car, and I kinda promised to talk to her and disappeared. Because of obvious reasons."

As soon as the words left his mouth, Charlie began to pick at the soda bottle label a little more vigorously. History. It might be her second favorite subject in school, but when it came to relationships? She freaking hated it. She wasn't used to it, and she sucked at navigating it. Hell, she wasn't even sure what it was that she was feeling. Was it jealousy? Possessiveness? No, it wasn't those. I was a vague sensation of worry. It was hesitation—almost nonexistent, but it was still there. But it was ridiculous. She was being ridiculous. Nope, she would just shove all that stuff away. "Yeah," she agreed quietly. "Yeah, I think you should apologize to Lydia."

She wasn't sure whether or not Stiles noticed the slight change in her demeanor, but he immediately backtracked. More than a little bit of stammering was involved. "Or maybe I shouldn't. I mean what would apologizing do? It would draw attention to the fact that there was something to apologize for in the first place. Who knows? Maybe she forgot about it. Lydia can forget about things, right? So me bringing it up could be a bad idea. Let sleeping dogs lie."

"Stiles."

"Seriously, just—"

"Stiles!" Her voice filled the car and he finally stopped his rambling. When he glanced at her again, his eyes were worried. Like he was afraid he had done something wrong. Charlie just raised her eyebrows and looked at him seriously. "It's alright for you to care about Lydia, okay? I'd be pretty freaking disappointed in you if you stopped. Got it?" She stared Stiles down and he nodded in understanding, but there was still a small crease between his eyebrows. Charlie winced internally, and shimmied over in her seat so she was sitting directly next to her. He inhaled sharply when she rested her head on his shoulder, but she pretended not to notice. "You should apologize to Lydia," she murmured, this time in a more definitive tone of voice. "We owe her pretty much whatever we can give her."

Charlie could feel Stiles's eyes on her, which probably wasn't the safest thing seeing as he was behind the wheel of a freaking car. It made her feel better, but she could still hear Erica's voice whispering the words 'eight years' in her ear over and over again like a little freaking devil standing on her shoulder. Ugh. She hated this. She hated feeling insecure. She never used be insecure. She used to flit through life with complete confidence and giving zero shits. Maybe that meant she was finally finding out what it felt like to have something to lose. And it sucked. But then Stiles reached down and grabbed her hand, lacing their fingers together, his thumb rubbing small circles on the back of her hand. Charlie glanced up at him through her eyelashes, studying his face. The moonlight threw the angles of his profile into sharp relief. She sighed and nestled a little closer to him. "If Darth Vader and Darth Maul got into a fight, who would win?"

Even in the dim lighting, Charlie could see a hint of a smile on his face. "Are we talking movies or comic books?"

Within about five minutes of that moment Charlie decided she would never think about or speak of again—that moment of doubt—seemed to be completely erased. She wasn't leaning on his shoulder anymore. Nope, she was back on the other side of the car, because if she sat any closer to him she would be getting repeatedly smacked in the face by his wild gesticulations. Because apparently there was no way whatsoever that Darth Maul would in a million years be able to defeat Darth Vader. The probability was akin to 'three separate Death Stars exploding in rapid succession', which was apparently Stiles speak for 'unlikely'. He slammed his fist against the steering wheel, she ticked arguments off on her fingers, and honestly she couldn't tell if they were yelling or laughing.

That little debate of theirs might have been the longest one to date. I lasted through the entire car ride back to...she was just going to have to keep calling it 'somewhere very far from here'. To be honest she didn't really have a clue where they were. Anyways, by the time they were parking the car the argument was still in full swing. "How can you actually side with freaking Darth Maul?!" Stiles demanded, slamming the car door shut.

"Um, for obvious reasons," she replied. "He's got a freaking two-for-one light saber."

"Two for o—are you kidding me? Hey!" Stiles protested, pointing at her angrily. "That stupid double-bladed light saber can be more problematic than helpful, okay? You could end up cutting off with your own hand with that thing!"

Charlie let out a scoff and rolled her eyes. "Oh, I'm sorry," she drawled out sarcastically. "Are you a Dark Lord of the Sith? Come on, Stiles. The guy has trained. He was apprenticed to Sidious. He has mad skills."

"Oh, 'mad skills'?" Stiles shot back using air quotes. "Seriously? Darth Vader's control over the force is so beyond Maul's! And in the comics Vader has defeated Maul multiple times!" He pressed the heels of his hands against his forehead and shook his head. "I—I can't even believe we're having this conversation."

Charlie let out an involuntary groan and circled around the car, abandoning the bags of food in the back seat so that she could smack him over the head. "What did we agree?" she growled harshly. Stiles opened and closed his mouth a few times to protest, but Charlie took a step forward, fixing him with a serious stare. "What. Did. We. Agree?"

Stiles made a face and his head fell back on his shoulders. Which in her opinion was essentially just admitting defeat. When he looked back up at her, his nose was wrinkled with something akin to disappointment. He was sulking. "We agreed that while the comics and the films are both equally valid interpretations of the Star Wars verse they are distinct entities and since you have not read the comics they are not valid in this discussion."

"Thank you."

"But just because the comic book verse isn't valid in this discussion does not make Vader kicking Maul's ass any less of a done deal!" he declared, throwing his arms in the air. "Stick a fork in it and everything!"

Charlie fought hard to keep a straight face. It was just so easy to goad him. She probably shouldn't be proud of that intense feeling of self-satisfaction she got when she riled him up, but he was just so freaking adorable when he was moderately infuriated. "I mean, come on, Charlie!" Stiles continued as the two of them trudged back towards the police transport van. "You can't seriously choose Maul over Vader. We need to get another opinion on this. Let's ask Scott."

"Scott has never even seen 'Star Wars'," Charlie scoffed. "You're just trying to find someone to blindly agree with you!"

"Yeah, well anybody blindly agreeing with me will be right and I will give you a list of fifteen separate reasons why! One—"

Before he could finish the sentence Charlie stopped short, smacking him in the chest to indicate for him to stop as well. When he looked at her questioningly, she inclined her head towards Allison's Toyota. Across the clearing they could see Allison and Scott sitting in the car, her head on his shoulder and his arm around her shoulders. Freaking adorable. As per usual. Charlie couldn't help but feel that little twinge of guilt in the pit of her stomach. Biting her lip, fished her phone out of the pocket of her jacket and looked down at the time. Forty three minutes. That's how much alone time they had gotten in the past...she didn't even know how long. "I don't think we should interrupt them," she murmured. "They've been interrupted way too often these days. Plus Allison's going to have to go home soon. We could grab some food, go for a walk, let them gaze at each other longingly for a while?"

Stiles's eyes traveled across the clearing as well. He pressed his lips together in a thin line and let a look of sad sympathy cover his face. "Yeah. That sounds good." The two of them shrank away, abandoning the clearing and leaving Scott and Allison to themselves for at least a little bit longer. "Plus," Stiles drawled out as they broke the line of the trees. "Maybe if they get some quality time Scott'll stop freaking talking about it so much."

"Hey!" Charlie snipped, elbowing him in the side. "That is uncool, man."

Stiles rolled his eyes and elbowed her right back. "You spend a day memorizing love notes and sprinting across school. Only then can you be an authority on what is and isn't 'uncool'."

After smacking him one last time, Charlie dodged over to the Jeep. She leaned in the open window, far enough that she almost toppled in, and grabbed the closest bag of fast food she could get her hands on before hauling herself out and jogging back towards Stiles. Immediately, she linked her arm through his and allowed him to guide her. She wasn't sure why, but she got the feeling Stiles knew where they were headed. She didn't ask where. He led her away from the clearing and towards the cliff face that bordered it. The biting winds stung her skin, causing her to pull her jacket closer around her and draw closer to Stiles. He was like a human heat lamp. Plus he smelled nice. She sucked in a deep breath and looked up at the stars blinking above her. That was one of the perks of living in a middle of nowhere town. You could actually see the stars. "It's a nice night," she mused quietly. "I mean sure we're holding a guy captive in a van, but other than the surreal supernatural crapfest problems...it's a nice night."

"Yeah," Stiles murmured, his voice distracted. "Yeah, nice." She glanced up at him, only to find his jaw clenched and his nose wrinkled—the face he always made when he really wanted to say something. And he was about to explode in three...two... one...

"Okay, Darth Maul?!" he exclaimed loudly. "Seriously? Vader—"

"Would destroy him," Charlie finished. "I know."

Stiles blinked at her, his eyebrows drawing together in confusion. "Wait, what? You think—"

"Oh, yeah, Darth Vader all the way," Charlie said, shrugging casually. "Dude has telekinesis. I was just playing devil's advocate with the whole Darth Maul thing."

Stiles's mouth dropped open, gaping at her so widely she felt the need to grab his chin and physically close his mouth. After she did it took a solid thirty seconds for him to speak again. "Wha—all that was you bullshitting an argument?"

"Debate team, remember. This is my dojo, dude."

"But why would you do something like that?!"

"It's a debate," she replied easily. "In my experience debates can be boring when both opponents agree."

Stiles stared at her for a few moments, his eyes widened. "You are scarily good at lying."

"Ah," Charlie shot back, raising her finger to make the point. "The trick is to make yourself actually believe the lie. People can't tell if you're lying if you believe you're telling the truth."

"You know what you did right there," Stiles said, giving he a wary look. "That's textbook behavior for a sociopath. I mean it's literally in the textbook for criminal psychology. Page 73, left hand column near the bottom of the page."

Charlie cocked her head to the side and jutted her lower lip out in contemplation. "Hm. I guess that gives me something to think about."

After a few more moments and some incoherent muttering, Stiles came to a stop. Taking a deep breath, Charlie let her eyes scan the area. They were at the edge of the cliff face, a line of trees on one side and open air on the other, looking over what she would generously call a city. The lights seemed like some poor imitation of the stars, trying to compete with them but being so gloriously outmatched. That was the thing about the stars. They had a way of making you and all of your problems seem small and insignificant. And honestly? That was a bit of a relief.

Drawing her attention away from her surroundings, Charlie looked back over at Stiles. He had taken a seat on a particularly large rock staring out across the expanse of city and forest before them. "Okay all sociopathic tendencies aside, I've got to say that is definitely a relief," he drawled out as she approached him.

Charlie frowned to herself at his wording and perched on the rock next to him. "What's a relief?"

"Um, that you would pick Vader over Maul," he said as if it was the most obvious thing in the world and throwing his arms wide open for dramatic effect. "For a second there I was afraid I was dating a complete moron. And I mean an epic degree of moron-hood. Like if a moron got clubbed over the head and was suffering from an acute concussion, that's what you would be."

Raising her eyebrows, Charlie slowly turned in his direction, fixing him in her sights. "Dating, huh?" she said, lifting up the bag of fast food and inspecting it carefully. "I'm still not sure you say that we're dating until we've been on an actual date. So does that mean this is our first date?"

Stiles let out a groan and rolled his eyes heavily. "Come on, Charlie. Are you really going to start with the semantic arguments right now?"

"What?!" Charlie demanded, widening her eyes innocently. "You're the one who has a computer file labeled 'The Master Plan'. I don't know what that master plan is. All this—" she waved her hand around them conspiratorially "—as far as I know all this could be part of it."

"Right," Stiles grumbled sarcastically. He raised his eyebrows defensively and pointed at himself. "I—I took Jackson hostage and parked him in the woods only to flee to yet a second location to avoid the cops—one of whom is my dad—all to orchestrate the opportunity to eat fast food in a forest while sitting on a rock. That's the epitome of romance. They'll write poems and songs about that one. Best plan ever—not convoluted at all."

Charlie made a face and shrugged casually. "It's all in how you market it, man. You say eating on a rock, I say starlight picnic."

Stiles shot her a dry look. "We're literally eating out of a paper bag," he deadpanned.

"Yes we are," Charlie said with a definitive nod. "And it is going to be delicious." She pried open the bag and reached inside to grab their food, but when she did she found it alarmingly empty. "What the—" She grappled around in the bag a few moments. Something was missing. Something important. "Damn it!" she growled. "No curly fries?! They're all in the other bag. This is a crisis of apocalyptic proportions."

A sound interrupted her ranting. She looked up at Stiles to find him laughing at her. "Hey," she cried, punching him in the shoulder. "Not funny."

"Of course not," he said, his tone patronizing. He blew out a long breath and scratched at the back of his neck, glancing back over his shoulder in the direction they just came from. "Okay, I can't believe I'm going to say this, but we can go back for the fries later. Just give me a burger. I'm starving. It feels like my stomach is slowly eating itself."

Grumbling to herself, she grabbed a burger and tossed it in the air, leaving him flailing a bit in an attempt to catch it. The two of them sat there in complete silence, eating their burgers. That was pretty much the only circumstance when you could get both of them to be completely silent barring any extreme circumstances. Food.

Charlie practically inhaled her burger, finishing it inside of about a minute in a half. When she finished, Charlie smacked her lips and looked back up at the stars. Wordlessly, she grabbed one of those pathetic, useless little napkins fast food joints always give you and wipes away the excess ketchup and mustard, tossing them back in the bag before getting to her feet. Taking a few steps away from the rock, she laid down flat on the ground and laced her fingers behind her head, the bed of dead leaves forming a soft mattress. After a few moments, she heard the crunching of leaves under feet and Stiles's head appeared in her plane of vision, hands shoved in his pockets and gazing down at her with a quizzical expression. "Um, what are you doing?" he demanded.

"What does it look like I'm doing?" she shot back.

"It looks like you're lying in dirt is what it looks like your doing."

"Then I guess I'm lying in the dirt," she chirped. "Care to join me?"

Stiles made a face at her but lowered himself to the ground as well, sidling up next to her. He rested his hands on his chest, lacing his fingers together, and blew out a long breath. Out of the corner of her eye she could see Stiles shooting her curious glances. A few seconds later he began to drum his fingers and sighed heavily. In that Stiles-like fashion, he was trying desperately to be patient and failing miserably. Him trying to be patient was just as futile as him trying not to fidget. "Sooooooo," he murmured. "You going to tell me what we're doing?"

Charlie plucked a leaf from the ground and began to tear it into little pieces, releasing each bit in the wind and allowing it to float away on the wind. She stared straight above her, removing her hands from behind her head and lifting them above her head. She used both thumbs and forefingers to form a small rectangle, like she was trying to frame a photograph. "Do you ever look at the stars?" she asked quietly. "I mean really look at them."

"Um, yeah," Stiles muttered back. "Yeah, sure."

"My dad and I used to do this thing when I was a kid," she murmured. Almost immediately she felt Stiles tense up a bit next to her. Not necessarily because he was actually tense—it was surprise mostly. She never really talked about her dad. Ever. Hell, even she was surprised she was bringing it up now. And if it was anybody else lying there next to her, she probably wouldn't have said anything at all. Finally she allowed herself to take a peek at the boy next to her. He was staring at her, those eyes of his a little wider than usual. His pupils were huge, the black almost overtaking their typical warm, light brown color. It was probably just because it was dark out, but Charlie couldn't help but wonder if it was because he was anxious about something. Wrenching her eyes away from his, she exhaled sharply and continued.

"Yeah," she breathed out. "We would go out on the lawn and look up at the stars. This one time he tried to teach me the constellations. That lasted about five minutes before we just started making up names for them. You see that over there—" she waved her hand at a particular configuration of shining lights "—that is the Hammer of Jeff. And over there is Monkey with Rash."

Stiles's eyes crinkled at the corners and a stupid, adorable smile covered his face. "'The Hammer of Jeff'?" he said with a snort. "How old were you when you came up with these names?"

"Oh, I didn't come up with those," Charlie said, pointing to herself. "No, those particular gems belong to one David Oswin, the glorious man-child that he was."

Stiles nodded to himself a bit before rolling on his side so he could look at her directly. "He sounds pretty awesome."

Charlie swallowed heavily and tried to smile back at him, but she couldn't really make the smile stick. It wasn't that she didn't want or feel like smiling. Her body just wouldn't let her keep it up. "He was. You would have liked him. And he would have liked you."

Stiles shifted his position so he could get a better look at her. "You think so?"

"Oh, yeah," Charlie said with a nod. "I mean sure he would have threatened your life and scared the crap out of you first—and he definitely would've enjoyed doing it—but he would have liked you. The two of you are the same brand of moron."

Immediately that look of mirth dropped from his face and his eyes narrowed at her. "Aw, come on," he whined. "Why do you always have to go and add that bit at the end?"

"Because it's true," she sighed. "Do you know how many times he put my hand in a bowl of water while I was sleeping? Lots."

She could both feel and hear Stiles fidgeting next to her. "Bwah...did you—"

"No, Stiles," Charlie sighed out, knowing exactly where is mind was going. "I did not pee myself." The wicked grin that then pulled at the corner of her lips was almost involuntary. "But he did."

A weird, poorly contained, garbled snort forced its way out of Stiles's nose. "Oh my God. I can't decide if that's inspired or suicidal. My dad freaks out if I accidently delete his recorded episodes of 'Cops' from the DVR. You—you actually made your dad pee the bed?"

"I did," Charlie replied with a solemn nod. "Or at least I think I did. When I woke up in the morning the sheets were in the washer. He only had the one set. And he was never that enthusiastic about doing the laundry. But it was pretty much confirmed when I found all of my shoelaces missing. Literally, he snuck into my closet and took every single pair of shoelaces."

"That is some Grade A parenting," Stiles murmured, sounding almost in awe of what he was hearing. "You were raised in the middle of a perpetual prank war. You make so much more sense now. It's like I got a peek at the man behind the curtain."

"What—so I'm the wizard of Oz now?" she drawled out sarcastically.

Stiles made a face and shrugged. "Your back story is shrouded in mystery."

"It is not."

"It is a little. Pretty much all I know is that you once lived in Portland and you stole a police horse during Mardi Gras. Allegedly. Which I guess means that you lived in New Orleans at some point. Or you just vacation there? Or it could have just been a long layover...I—I really don't know. I do have a working theory, though."

"Oh," she chirped, glancing at him out of the corner of her eye. "You have a theory, do you?"

"I do," he replied. "I think that you might be a part of the witness protection program."

"Seriously?!"

"Or a spy," he prompted. "You've moved here to ferret out all the festering criminal elements in Beacon Hills and report back to your governmental overlords."

"Then why would I be living with Mel?"

"She's your handler."

"Right, Mel is a hardcore government employee," Charlie drawled out. "She'll bake my enemies cookies until they die of heart disease."

"Hey," Stiles interjected, waving a finger in her face. "It is a working theory. Still in draft form."

Charlie let out a grunt of frustration and folded her arms across her chest and narrowed her eyes up at the sky above her. In that moment Stiles stayed quiet. Sure they had been laughing about it, but talking about her dad had a way a dredging up that small degree of melancholy that made up her disposition. Stiles understood that. He didn't push.

Her eyes fell on a particular configuration of stars. Technically it was Orion, but when she was six her dad had pointed it out and insisted that it was him playing baseball. She had even brought a book to him and pointed it out. He had just looked at her blankly and said, '_who are you going to trust, some publisher you've never met or your father?_'. God, she missed him. She missed him so much she felt like she was choking on it. Letting out a shaky breath, she tugged at the hem of her dress. She needed to be thinking about something else—anything else.

"You know some people think there's going to be a second big bang?" she said, her voice a bit lighter. "So as it is now the universe is infinite and ever-expanding, right? One day, billions of years from now, it'll collapse in on itself and explode all over again. And when that happens all of the matter that was you and me will be scattered across the sky. And then someone or something else will look up and they'll see little bits of us in the stars." She sucked in a deep breath and rolled over on her side so that she was facing him. "Maybe one day I'll get to be a constellation."

As soon as she finished, Stiles's forehead crinkled and he let out a disbelieving scoff, making Charlie frown to herself. "Okay, I know it's stupid, but it's a nice thought!" she said defensively. "What?!"

Stiles opened and closed his mouth a few times, shaking his head at her. "I just...I just don't think I'm ever going to get tired of talking to you."

"Yeah, well—!" The snarky comeback Charlie was about to unleash died on her lips. The two of them were so big on the witty banter that it was still a little bit jarring when they switched into the whole genuine thing. And the way Stiles was looking at her, they had definitely taken a step towards the genuine. They stared at each other for a few moments, but then Stiles's eyes flickered lower for a moment, resting on her lips. When he raised them to meet hers again, there was a question behind them. He leaned in towards her, holding his breath almost like he was asking permission. Charlie grabbed hold of the fabric of his shirt, pulling him towards her as she closed the distance between them.

Charlie was pretty sure she would never get used to kissing Stiles. Not because it was strange or uncomfortable—she was more than comfortable with it. It was because no two kisses seemed to be the same. They always seemed to catch her just a little bit off guard. One would be fast, another slow. One would be forceful, another tender. But no matter what, each one would leave her just a little bit breathless. This kiss was a short one, their lips moving against each other for just a few moments as Stiles wrapped his arms around her waist and pulled her closer to him. When they broke apart, their eyes met for a moment making Charlie flush red. Up until now their kisses had been urgent—stealing a few moments in a freaking storage closet or some reassurance between the various crises. They hadn't really had the time to get to know each other in this context yet.

Clearing her throat awkwardly, Charlie ducked her head down and rested it on his chest. She wrapped her arms around his middle as well so that her form was pressed against him. It was a closeness she wasn't accustomed to. But she felt like she could be—the heat of his body keeping her warm, the feeling of his fingers winding in her hair, the sound his heart thrumming in his chest. That's something she could get used to. But there was one little detail that gave her pause.

"You're heart's beating like you just ran a marathon," she murmured, her brow furrowing in confusion.

She heard his breath hitch as well and he nodded. "Yup," he muttered, his voice almost sounding anxious.

"I mean really fast," she piled on. "It sounds like a freaking helicopter is about to bust out of your chest."

"Mm-hm."

Charlie frowned to herself and glanced up at him. Though, to be honest, given her position all she could really see was the tip of his nose. Not the best view when you where trying to gauge emotion. If you could pick a facial feature that emoted the least, it was probably the tip of the nose. "Okay," she returned, her voice thick with confusion. "Why is your heart beating so fast?"

When he didn't respond, Charlie shifted so that she could push herself up on her elbows and look him full in the face. He made a high-pitched noise of protest as he was forced to loosen his hold on her, but she ignored him. When she finally managed to prop herself up enough to get a decent look at him, she raised her eyebrows expectantly. "Okay, what's the deal?"

Stiles opened and closed his mouth a few times, pushing himself up a bit on his elbows as well. Charlie cocked her head to the side and quirked an eyebrow at him. Stiles let out a whining groan and collapsed back onto the leaves, letting out a whining groan. Charlie felt her eyebrows furrow even more. "Okay, seriously, dude, what is it?"

"I'm nervous!" he finally exclaimed, waving his hands around frantically. "There are nerves involved. I am suffering from nerves." He started waving his hands back and forth between them frantically. "You—you make me nervous. You kind of always have. Pretty much since the second I met you."

"The second you met me?" Charlie demanded, her face screwing up into a confused and slightly disbelieving expression. "Why would I make you nervous? That's idiotic."

Stiles let out a theatrical sigh and rolled his eyes heavily before glowering at her a bit. "Oh, I don't know, Charlie," he drawled out, layering almost impossible levels of sarcasm over his words. "No—you know what? You're totally right! Some gorgeous girl I've never seen before walks up to me out of the blue, makes a 'Star Wars' reference, and then walks off again all mysterious-like? Why would something like that ever make me even the slightest bit nervous? And when that girl—who turns out to be hilariously funny and one of the smartest people on the face of the planet—starts hanging out with me and apparently enjoys my company enough to keep doing it—that should have zero impact on me, right? And then, to top it all off, that girl starts kissing me on a semi-regular basis? You're right! No reasons at all to be nervous at all! Zero reasons. Zilch. Nada—"

Then Stiles went on one of what she like to call his 'thesaurus rants'. They usually manifested when he was worked up about something. Charlie always thought Stiles was cute when he got into one of those loops, especially with that expression of intense, annoyed frustration on his face. But what was even cuter that that? The look he got on face when she shut him up.

"None!" Stiles barreled on, ignorant to the mischievous smile that was tugging at her lips. "And I mean not one single, solitary, miniscule—"

"Stiles!"

"What?!" he demanded, actually sounding a bit offended that she had interrupted him.

Charlie shimmied forwards against the ground, leaning forwards so her face was hovering just above his. A mischievous smirk formed on her face as she narrowed her eyes at him. "Stiles," she repeated, her tone matter-of-fact. "Shut up."'

Snaking a hand behind his neck, she pulled his face up to meet hers, crushing her lips against his. Stiles instinctively kissed back. His arm looped around her middle, one hand finding its way to the small of her back, drawing her in, while the other hand brushed against her cheek for a moment before winding into her hair. But then, seemingly out of the blue, he made a noise of protest and began to shake his head.

"Nuh-uh," he mumbled, drawing away from her slightly. He withdrew his hand from her hair, instead using it to push her back a bit. Letting out an annoyed harrumph, Charlie pushed herself up on her elbows and looked at him expectantly. Stiles had that usual slightly dazed expression he got whenever they kissed, but he also had this look of weird determination on his face. "Nope. No. You can't keep doing that."

"Doing what?" she said, her voice tight with frustration.

"Doing wha—kissing me every time you want me to stop talking!" he spluttered. "That's—that's not fair! That is an unfair advantage. You're using your feminine wiles on me!"

"My what?"

"Your feminine wiles," he exclaimed, waving his fingers in her face for some bizarre form of dramatic effect. "Your wiles of the feminine variety."

Charlie exhaled sharply and let herself fall backwards, collapsing on the bed of leaves beneath her. She looked up at the sky above her unseeingly and shook her head. "You've got to be freaking kidding me," she whispered, more to herself than anything else.

"Hey!" Stiles protested pushing himself in the sitting position so he could look at her accusatorially. "It is a blatant manipulation!"

"You're right," Charlie murmured in a defeated tone.

"What?"

The weird, high-pitched sound of Stiles's voice made Charlie smile to herself. It was like he was just asking her to mess with him. And she was more than happy to oblige. She let out a plaintive sigh and pressed her lips into a thin line. "I said you're right. I am prepared to not make out and just talk. Just like you want."

All of a sudden Stiles just stopped. He totally froze in place, except, that is, for his lips which kept moving, like he was trying to speak but no words were coming out. Then his eyes widened with something that vaguely resembled horror. She recognized the look on his face. It was the look of someone who realized they had just made a terrible mistake. He then proceeded to let out a slightly-deranged sounding chuckle. "Yeah," he drawled out, peering down at her. "You know that thing I just said. How's about—how's about we forget about that? Screw that. Never happened. I—I am fully prepared to be manipulated."

"No!" Charlie declared with mock enthusiasm. "No, I want to talk! I am prepared for an in depth emotional conversation. I need an emotional catharsis right now! A catharsis that can only be obtained by revealing my soul through intense and exhausting conversation. A conversation that might last all night."

"O—okay," Stiles replied, rolling her eyes a bit. "Alright, we get it."

Stiles ducked down, attempting to pick up where he had so moronically insisted they leave off, but before he could she lifted her hand, pressing a finger against his lips and forcing him to stop. "Hey!" she chided. "Hey, do not use your masculine wiles on me. I stand strong!"

Stiles exhaled sharply through his nose and narrowed his eyes at her, clearly unamused. "You done?" he mumbled against that one finger holding him at bay.

Charlie cocked her head to the side and pursed her lips in consideration. She took her time about it too, leaving Stiles to fume. "Yeah," she finally sighed out, withdrawing her hand. "I'm done."

After rolling his eyes and mumbling something only semi-coherent, Stiles leaned down again planting his lips on hers. And this time, the kiss was not tentative. Or gentle. Or particularly coordinated. Enthusiastic was probably the best way to describe it. At least it was the word she opted to use because it was a hell of a lot more dignified than frantic. Sure there were probably leaves stuck in her hair by that point and a tree root was definitely jabbing into her back. Sure she was pretty sure neither of them were entirely sure what they were doing—they were both pretty freaking inexperienced with the whole thing—but honestly? It didn't really matter.

She should have been cold—the night air was biting and that Lydia-approved dress she had donned that morning wasn't exactly designed for the outdoors. But she didn't feel cold. No, a feeling of warmth spread throughout her, beginning in her chest and radiating out. The both of them lying on their sides, her arms wound around his neck, pulling him as close as she could manage. His arms wrapped around her, one hand cupping the back of her neck while the other slid under her jacket. His hands were warm, the heat of them seeping through the thin fabric of her dress. Charlie arched into him and suddenly their balanced shifted. The two of them rolled against the padded ground, Stiles's arms holding Charlie in place and pulling her on top of him, their legs tangled together awkwardly. Her hair fell down, creating a sort of curtain around them and blocking out the rest of the world.

This was ridiculous, right? This feeling of needing to be closer to another person. The physical draw to them. It didn't make any logical sense. And for once, Charlie didn't give a crap about logic. She was too preoccupied with the feeling of his lips on hers, his hair as it ran through her fingers, and his hands holding her to him. Then one of his hands shifted, slowly sliding down her spine. Stiles gave a sharp intake of breath and his hand stopped abruptly, right at the small of her back. His lips pinched together tightly for a moment. It was just so adorably transparent.

Chuckling into their kiss, Charlie leaned in a little closer, brushing her lips against his neck as she brought them closer to his ear. She could practically hear his heartbeat as the blood pounded through his carotid artery. "So are you waiting for permission or something?" she murmured quietly.

Stiles's breath hitched and he swallowed heavily before responding. "Permission for what?" he demanded, sounding far more confused than he deserved to. Especially given the way his fingers were splayed out and his thumb was rubbing small circles against her hip.

Charlie pulled back a little, just far enough to look him in the eye. "You were making a move to put your hand on my ass," Charlie replied, inclining her head in the direction of that hand.

"Wha—no I wasn't," Stiles spluttered, shaking his head.

Charlie raised her eyebrows at him pointedly. "Yes you were."

"No I wasn't."

"You're seriously going to deny it?"

"Yes!" he exclaimed. "I mean no. Because there's nothing to deny because I wasn't going to do anything!"

Charlie drew back from him—far enough to see that ever-so-slightly guilty expression on his face—and rolled her eyes heavily. Without saying another word, she placed covered his hand hovering at the small of her back with her own and slid it a little further down so that it was planted firmly on her butt. "There," she said matter-of-factly. "How's that?"

But Stiles didn't respond. At least he didn't say anything. The reaction was immediate. Stiles's eyes widened with something she was pretty sure was alarm and his mouth dropped open. He actually looked vaguely concussed, like he hand been hit over the head with a club wrapped in something soft. "Stiles," she said, narrowing her eyes at him questioningly. "Are you okay?"

Stiles swallowed heavily and nodded. "I'm fine," he said, his voice sounding weirdly mechanical. "Just...committing this moment to memory."

Charlie pursed her lips and nodded in something resembling understanding. But then that period of time dragged on longer and longer, making Charlie frown to herself. "So is there a timetable or something I can work with or..."

She didn't get a response. Stiles's face remained oddly blank, and it seemed like it might stay that way for a while. Fighting hard to keep the stupid grin off her face, Charlie leaned forwards and planted one last, abrupt kiss on his lips before removing his hand from her butt and slowly getting to her feet. "Alright," she murmured. "Alright. Well I'm going to go check in on Scott and Allison, maybe pick up some curly fries, and give you a chance to reboot your brain. Stay here. Don't move. And when I get back we can do a whole lot more of this. How does that sound?"

Stiles just nodded stupidly, probably not hearing a word she was saying. The whole scenario kind of made her want to laugh. That probably wasn't the right reaction to have. She never seemed to have the right reactions to things. Why was that? It was like part of her brain was broken or something. Like part of her was broken. She spared Stiles one last glance over her shoulder as she walked away. Slowly that concussed look on his face faded away and was replaced by the biggest shit-eating grin. That stupid smile made her heart seize up.

Taking a deep breath, Charlie strode through the forest towards where their car was parked, trying to keep the smile off of her face and failing miserably. What was this that she was feeling? Her body felt like it was humming and she had this weird sort of tingling sensation in her fingertips. Plus she was a bit light-headed. Oh crap, she was giddy. Kissing Stiles made her giddy. It just wasn't freaking fair. All of the sudden someone waltzes into your life and then they get to have this influence over you without you being able to do anything about it. Most of the time when she zoned out in class she was thinking about productive things, like supernatural theories or how to get that bestiary translated. But these days? Now she was thinking about running her hands through his hair and kissing that stupid face of his. She was turning into a bit of a cliché. And what's more? She was pretty sure she didn't care. He just...made her happy. And that scared her a bit.

When it came to being happy, Charlie had always relied on herself. She was a firm believer in that old adage 'happiness comes from within'. It was her responsibility to create and maintain said happiness. And that had always been pretty easy. It might sound narcissistic to admit but she liked herself, and so she had always gotten by pretty well. It was easy. But now that she had moved to Beacon Hills and now that she was staying put, she wasn't the only variable in her 'happiness equation' anymore. Now there was Mel and Lydia and especially Stiles. She was starting to need them. Now her happiness depended on them as much as it did on her. She wanted to be okay with that. She was trying very hard to be okay with that. And for the first time, she felt like she was on her way.

The wind whipped through the trees, howling in her ears. It whipped her hair around, into her face. That slight stinging sensation brought her back to herself. All of that warmth of a moment ago seemed to fade away, dissipating into the cold and the dark that surrounded her. Drawing her jacket in closer around her, she picked up her pace and marched towards the cars. She could see them not so far in the distance, the moonlight glinting off the shiny metal. Then, all of the sudden, a twig snapped. It was a quiet sound, barely perceptible, but it echoed.

Charlie stopped short. It as incredible how quickly things could shift. How abruptly that switch can be flipped and you can be forced from contentment to alarm. Adrenaline shot through her, her eyes darting around frantically to take in her surroundings. Everything around her was still, but her heart began to pound in her chest. Something was off. She couldn't quite put her finger on it, but something was wrong. Shit. She had somehow managed to put herself in yet another 'horror movie' scenario. Charlie took a few tentative steps forward, squinting into the dark. The cars were coming more and more into focus and that's when she saw it. The back of the prison transport van was wide open—gaping and empty. Ice flooded through her veins and she froze in place, fear rooting her to the spot where she stood. "Oh my—"

Her words were cut off by a sharp pain at the back of her neck, making her gasp. Slowly, she reached a shaking hand up to that spot. She had to force herself to—she already knew what she would find. A thin, long cut. Charlie withdrew her hand and stared at her fingertips. They had been stained red with warm blood that was rapidly cooling in the night air. But it wasn't just blood that was making her fingers sticky. There was also that transparent goo with which she had become all too familiar. That's when it finally reached her ears—that low hissing noise.

A searing pain shot through her body, starting at that cut and then shooting outwards until it reached her fingers and toes. Wave after wave pulsed through her, making her body spasm violently, like she was being tasered over and over again. Her body contorted, causing her knees buckled beneath her, and she collapsed, colliding face first with the forest floor. She tried to get up—she tried to scream—but her mind had totally relinquished control of her body. Sparks burst in her vision and everything seemed to shake. No matter how much she blinked, nothing would stay still. The world seemed to be slipping away from her, and there wasn't a think she could hold on to. This wasn't just paralysis. It was something else. Something more.

A quiet thump landed somewhere near her head. It had been in the tree. She didn't look up. She had forgotten to look up. Charlie's breathing hitched, coming out in short, panicked breath. She could feel a presence looming over her. She could feel its hot breath against her face as it hissed in her ear. And all she could see when it slunk away from her was scales. The flaring lights in her eyes closed in, blotting out the rest of the world, and she couldn't see anything at all.

**Hey guys! I hope you enjoyed the chapter. Some adventure, some kissing, and my personal favorite, THE CLIFFHANGER ENDING! Yup, I suck for doing that to you. But guess what Charlie being knocked out means? One giant Peter/Charlie scene, coming right up. And spoiler, they're going to be bowling!**

**Soundtrack!**

**Charlie driving the Jeep and the gang talking about Jackson.**

**-~-~-~-~-~So Close I Almost Believed It – BEGINNERS**

**The Darth Maul vs. Darth Vader debate.**

**-~-~-~-~-~Put the Days Away – Sun Airway**

**Charlie and Stiles get some alone time.**

**-~-~-~-~-~50's – House of Wolves**

**Charlie gets caught by the kanima. End chapter.**

**-~-~-~-~-~Shut Eye – Stealing Sheep (I like this song. It's quietly menacing)**

**References!**

**'The Hammer of Jeff' and 'Monkey with Rash' are both constellations made up by the awesome Shawn Spencer of Psych in the episode 'From the Earth To Starbucks'. I love to throw in references to that show when I can! It kind of shaped my sense of humor in a big way. I guess the term 'nut shelling' came from them too? That's the first place I heard it but I'm not sure if it's a 'thing' or not.**


	24. Paralytic

**Disclaimer: 'Teen Wolf' isn't mine. Shocking, right? But it's true. If there are any similarities in content or dialogue, it has probably originated with the show.**

**A huge thank you to meels234, XLostxinxWonderlandX314, AcklesIdjit, DarlingPeterPan, brighteyes96, Fahdza, cookie2718, Valkyrie101, WinchesterDixonBros, Hongo En, kickarseanime, coffeeshopwriter, Guest, Etro13, A.T, Haley, Someperson, Liz510, Iste, katiesgotagun, OhSkinnyLove, embracethequirkiness, Gee Brittany, onethousandmoths, DrazThePacifist, run-robin-run, BewareTheBearShark, artificial-paradises, anon, Hanna, Guest, Guest, Cameron, Guest, Female whovian, Exuberance of Youth, megadeanlove, Guest, Guest, ANONYMOUS, zvc56, Hanna, Helaliafreak97, Guest, shy-lady, OBSESSEDwithPOWERS, Sonny13, Emma, Guest, RK13, and Just Anonymous for reviewing! I love you guys!**

Chapter 24 – Paralytic

"_You've been ignoring me."_

_Charlie clapped her hands even tighter over her ears, trying to block out the sound. It didn't fully work. She could still hear the muffled noise of bowling balls clattering into pins like faraway crashes of thunder. But it still had its desired effect. That voice—that annoying, persistent voice that had become the metaphorical mosquito buzzing in her ear for the past few weeks—was effectively silenced. Sure she probably looked like a child, shoving her fingers in her ear and closing her eyes like she had yet to attain 'object permanence', but that didn't matter. It wasn't like anybody who was actually alive was around could see her._

_It had been a few days since she had had to deal with Peter's bullshit. Whatever the hell it was that Deaton had given her—those eye drop things—they worked. Sort of. Peter might have been around for a little while, but afterwards she would slip into some deeper plane of sleep. It was still—calm. Like if the dream version of herself had done some yoga, meditated, and maybe took an Ambien. Good sleep—practically Peter-less sleep—for almost a week. But, as with every other quick fix known to man, there were some consequences._

_Apparently repressing a full aspect of your subconscious for a full week could have negative effects. Who knew? As it stood now, Charlie knew she was dreaming—that much was clear. The bowling alley she was sitting in wasn't the one from Beacon Hills. Between the sticky floors and light coating of dust, dirt, and cigarette ash that covered every surface it wasn't nearly clean enough for that. But despite the fact that she was, in fact, dreaming, everything had taken on a new degree of vividness. It felt so real. From the tiny grooves and divots in the bowling balls, to the smell of stale beer and French fries, to the cheesy, 80s era graphics on the scoreboard displays, it was a perfect replica of the first bowling alley she could remember going to back when they lived in Wilmington. _

_No, calling it a replica wouldn't be accurate enough. It was that bowling alley. Only instead of her dad and his league, she was stuck there with Peter. Talk about destroying childhood nostalgia. And now—for an extra dose of that nostalgia—she was sulking like a six-year-old. Hell, she even had those braided pigtails and the novelty bowling shirt she wore when she was a kid—the one with the dancing pins on the back. She still had that shirt, packed deep in the bottom of one of those boxes she had stored up in the attic. That shirt was old, dirty, and frayed at the edges. The one she was wearing now was clean and new, the polyester scratching uncomfortably against her skin._

_Sighing loudly to himself, Peter strode forwards, grabbed his bowling ball, and sent it flying towards the pins. Charlie groaned internally as she heard them all clattering to the ground. What was normally such a satisfying noise had been rendered hollow and, worse than that, annoying. You might think it was freaking boring to get a strike every single time, but Peter didn't seem to mind all that much. He turned around to face her, that insufferable smile covering his face. "Come on, Charlie," he said, nodding in her direction. "You're up."_

_Charlie didn't respond, instead opting to stare blankly in front of her, hands shoved in her pockets and a dour expression on her face. At the sight of her, Peter rolled his eyes so heavily she thought it might cause the earth shake beneath them. "Seriously, Charlie?" he demanded. "The silent treatment? It's been a half hour. Do you really want to keep going that route?"_

_Again, she didn't speak. She just jutted out her chin defiantly. Sighing loudly, Peter dragged his feet and collapsed next to her on the dull orange, plastic bench, draping his arm behind her shoulders. Instinctively she shrank inwards, bringing herself as far away from physical contact as she could, but Peter didn't notice. Or at least he pretended not to notice. _

"_I've got to say, Charlie," he drawled out. "Once again I am disappointed in your failure to see my potential as a resource." He looked to her, again awaiting a response—probably some snarky comment—but she simply raised an eyebrow. He let out a slightly disappointed scoff before continuing. "Think, Charlie," he continued, tapping a finger against his temple for emphasis. "You were just exposed to kanima venom. Kanima venom is a paralytic. And yet here you are. Your nervous system went crazy and you passed out. Aren't you the least bit curious as to how that happened?"_

_Charlie glowered at him, grinding her teeth together. "Let me make a random guess. It's because of you."_

_Peter wrinkled his nose in a strange pout and folded his arms across his chest. "Well that's kind of offensive."_

"_So you're saying that's it's not because of you."_

"_Oh, no, it's because of me," Peter replied quickly, his tone almost bitter. "I'd just rather people stop assuming it's me all the time."_

"_Yeah, there's a way to make sure that happens," Charlie drawled out sarcastically. "Stop being the freaking villain."_

"_Villain?" Peter muttered, almost sounding a little bit hurt. "Please don't call me that, Charlie."_

_Charlie let out a bitter snort and raised her eyebrows at him. "So you're saying you're not the villain."_

_Peter made a clucking noise and raised a hand, silently asking her to be quiet. "I will admit to having had some villainous tendencies—in the past, of course. But to brand me 'the Villain'...it just makes me sound so one-dimensional. Plus it does not at all take into account my tragic backstory."_

"_I used to give a shit about your tragic backstory," Charlie bit back. "But the 'aw, poor Peter' moments pretty much came to a grinding halt when you physically assaulted me and shoved your consciousness into my head."_

_Peter let his head fall back on his shoulders and groaned loudly. "When are you going to let that go, hm? Let bygones be bygones."_

_Charlie straightened in her seat, her head snapping around to glower at him. "Let bygones be bygones?" she spat. "Peter, how can bygones be bygones if those bygones are still in freaking progress!"_

_Peter pursed his lips in consideration and cocked his head to the side, like he was considering he argument. "Okay. You have a point there."_

_Sinking back down into her seat, Charlie let out a heavy sigh and rubbed at her forehead to ward off a headache. Could you even get headaches in dreams? With the luck she had lately, the answer was yes. "Can we just skip ahead to the part where you tell me how you've royally screwed me over this time?"_

_Peter paused, giving her a withering look before continuing. "I don't care for the way you phrased that, but fine. Let's move on." He cleared his throat, like he was preparing for some grand story, folding his hands behind his head and resting his feet on the ball return in front of them. "The simple fact of the matter, Charlie, is that you are human."_

"_No, really?" she drawled out sarcastically. "Thanks for the update."_

"_Don't be so blasé about it," Peter snapped back. "You were forced into some...rarified circumstances."_

"_By you," she pointed out bitterly._

"_Yes, by me, we get it," Peter drawled out, bobbing his head along with his words. "The point is that even though you're still human—which is a tragedy in my opinion—the fact that I'm here makes you more...sensitive to the supernatural."_

"_Sensitive," Charlie scoffed. "What the hell do you mean sensitive?"_

_Peter rolled his eyes at her ire. "It's just a word. There's no need to go and get all defensive about it. The point is that there's only so much of the 'supernatural element' or whatever you want to call it that the human body can withstand. I happen to be a part of that supernatural element. So as long as I'm locked up here—" he poked her in the forehead "—then you might be experiencing some...technical difficulties."_

_At his words Charlie froze, her brow creasing in concentration. There was that tone in his voice—that slightly smug one. He was scheming. He was still scheming even within the confines of her own head. Great. Now she got to feel violated in a whole new way. She leaned forwards, her fingers gripping the edge of the seat, only to find them in contact with a giant wad of gum. A still sticky wad of gum. Her jaw twitched violently—both from the aforementioned gum and from Peter's increasingly infuriated commentary—and she forced out the next few words. "What do you mean, 'so long as you're locked up here'?" she demanded, her voice tight. "How long do you intend on squatting?"_

"_You read too much into things, Charlie," Peter said, waving his hand dismissively. He reached over to his left towards that small table, equally as worn and as drably orange as those benches, and when he turned back towards her he was holding two beers, each of them in one of those crappy plastic cups they always used in bowling alleys. Well, Charlie had to give herself credit for one thing. At least her dreams were authentic. _

_Peter held one of those probably lukewarm beers out to her expectantly, but she just eyed the drink with suspicion. Letting out a sigh that was some combination of disappointment and exasperation, Peter rolled his eyes heavily. "Seriously, Charlie?" he demanded. "This is your subconscious. Anything that hurts you...it hurts me too. It's self-preservation at its most basic level. In case you haven't noticed, self preservation is kind of my thing. So are you going to take this beer or not?"_

_Jaw still clenched, Charlie narrowed her eyes at him for a moment longer before snatching it out of his hand, the liquid slopping messily over the side and spilling onto that pair of frayed, dirtied jeans she was wearing. "You know what, Charlie?" Peter said as she wiped off her jeans. "One of these days your trust issues are going to come back to bite you in the ass."_

"_When it comes to you, trust issues are an exercise in that self-preservation you love oh, so much," she snapped back._

_Peter made a face and nodded in tentative agreement. "That's fair. But I'm not the only one in your life, am I?"_

_Charlie took a big swallow of her beer, glancing at him out of the corner of her eye. "What the hell are you talking about?"_

_Peter pressed his lips together in a wan smile and gave her a patronizing look. "Oh, come on, Charlie," he drawled out. "This is me you're talking to. I've been in your head long enough to see straight through the bullshit." He folded his hands in his lap and let out a plaintive, theatrical sigh. "I'm talking about Stiles. But you already knew that, didn't you?"_

_Charlie ignored that slightly insecure jolt at the pit of her stomach, refusing to let the tension she felt manifest on her face. There really wasn't any use denying it at this point. Peter knew her. Peter knew her well. And that pissed her off. She was supposed to be an enigma wrapped in a riddle and steeped in mystery. She had carefully built up this network of walls around herself, so she could pick and choose the people that she let through and how far they would get. _

_For Charlie, there were levels of intimacy. Level one people got to know her name. Level two people got her contact information. Actual trust didn't happen until leve1 seven and to access her tragic back story you needed to be at least an eight. She had yet to actually let anybody into level eight—not really. Except for Mel, but she had actually witnessed said back story. Yes, she had let a few very special people peek over that wall, but none of them had fully been allowed to access that part of her life. Peter? He took a freaking battering ram and forced his way through. And that wasn't freaking fair._

"_I have no idea what you're talking about," Charlie replied in a deadened tone._

_Peter clucked in disapproval and cocked his head to the side, shooting her a skeptical look. "Charlie, please. Don't be so obtuse. We are both perfectly aware of your problems in that regard. If you want my opinion—"_

"_I don't want your opinion," Charlie snapped, cutting him off. "You don't get to have an opinion. You have no right to an opinion."_

"_Charlie, I'm just looking out for you. I have your best interests at heart."_

"_Just so long as they don't conflict with your own," Charlie muttered back with a roll of her eyes._

_Peter smiled that 'used car salesman' smile of his and pointed at her emphatically. "Precisely," he replied, his voice the strangest mix of sarcasm and sincerity she had ever heard. "So all I'm going to say is that you and Stiles together? I think that's a good fit. Adorable, even. I'd hate to see it fall apart because of your complete inability to let anybody get close enough to you that they might have a significant impact on your life. If you spend all your time making sure losing somebody won't make you lonely, then you're just going to end up alone."_

_Charlie let out a bland, tired laugh, and raised her eyebrows at him. "Are you speaking from experience?"_

_Suddenly, everything went quiet. Unnaturally quiet. The type of quiet that rang in your ears, almost like someone had rung a gong right next to her head. Finally, she looked around at her surroundings, only to find that the bowling alley was complete deserted. All of those faceless people who, moments before, had been playing, laughing, shouting, they had all vanished into thin air. Even that old juke box in the corner that blasted out oldies from worn records had been silenced. It was just her and Peter, sitting there completely quiet._

_Charlie glanced over at the man sitting next to her. Something had shifted behind his eyes. It wasn't that usual condescending mirth she usually saw where when he reveled in her personal problems. It was something a bit darker. Then he smiled, but that smile didn't reach his eyes. They stayed dead. He draped his arm around her shoulder, pulling her towards him in a one-armed hug. "Come on, Charlie," he said casually. "I think it's about time we played this game."_

_Without another word, he clapped his hands on his knees and pushed himself to his feet. His gleaming black dress shoes clashed horribly against scuffed wooden floors. It seemed wrong, out of place. But then again that was par for the course with Peter. He never stayed where he was supposed to. Charlie watched him through narrowed eyes as he selected his bowling ball, testing the weights. "You know that's not regulation footwear, right?" Charlie sighed out, scratching absently at her forehead._

"_It's a dream, Charlie," he drawled out. "Who's going to stop me? Now are we going to play or what?"_

_Rolling her eyes to herself, Charlie clambered to her feet as well. She strolled over to the ball return, dragging her feet towards the ball return. Her eyes scanned the options until they settled on the one she was looking for—the one with the giant Spiderman logo on it. She had used that ball for over a year. It was a little too small for her hands now, but what the hell? She wasn't above a little nostalgia._

"_You get first roll," Peter said, the smirk that was no doubt on his face evident from his tone of voice._

_Wrinkling her nose in distaste, Charlie narrowed her eyes at him. He was still wearing that same outfit from the day of the Winter Formal—those black slacks, the red dress shirt that may or may not have been covered in blood, and that long black trench coat which was currently thrown carelessly over a nearby chair. Still scowling, she lifted the ball and took moved towards the lane as he took a seat in one of her chairs. "You know you look ridiculous in that getup," she announced, not bothering to look back at him. "If you ever do manage to re-corporealize yourself, try to find something that isn't quite so dated."_

_A deep chuckle emanated from somewhere behind her. "Says the girl wearing pigtails and a triple poly blend."_

"_Button up your shirt," she spat. "I don't want to be forced to look at your chest hair. As in the single chest hair. One of them."_

_Peter might have had a retort, but whatever it was she didn't hear it. Instead she stepped forwards, her toes a few inches away from that line that signified the beginning of the lane. She adopted the appropriate stance—the one her dad had taught her when she was a kid. Crouching down slightly, she drew her arm back, advanced towards the lane, and let the ball fly._

(*)*(*)*(*)*(*)*(*)*(*)*(*)*(*)*(*)*(*)*(*)*(*)

Blackness surrounded her. She could feel the bed of dried, crumbled leaves beneath her and hear some combination of the wind through the trees and the blood pounding in her ears. But she couldn't see a single thing. She tried to push herself up on her elbows—to get a look at her surroundings—but she couldn't seem to manage it. No matter how much she concentrated, her arms wouldn't move a single inch. Her heart began to pound in her chest and panic clawed at her throat. All she could find was the cold and the dark. She was locked inside her own head, and if she was being honest it wasn't the most accommodating of places.

And that's when it occurred to her. She was paralyzed. That's what usually happened after kanima attacks, wasn't it? That was what happened to Stiles, to Derek, and even to Jackson. They were exposed to kanima venom, they were paralyzed. So apparently she got to be both the exception and the rule. Fan-freaking-tastic.

Slowly, the sound of the wind in her ears was replaced by something else. Voices—anxious voices—surrounding her like a flock of chattering birds. They were yammering on at a million words a minute, and she couldn't distinguish a single word of it. It was too muddled, like someone had submerged her head in water. And then she realized the reason it was so dark. Her eyes were still closed. Freaking genius, she was. But they still felt so damn heavy, like they were made of lead.

"Oh my God," she heard Allison's voice whisper. "Oh my God. Do—do we need to get her to a hospital? Did she hit her head? What happened?!"

It was Stiles's voice she heard next. And it sounded angry. She wasn't used to hearing Stiles angry. Not like this. "What the hell do you think it was?" he spat. "It was Jackson. It's always freaking Jackson. I swear to God, the next time I see his face I'm gonna—"

"Hey." This time it was Scott that spoke, his voice gentle and solicitous. "Hey, man. She's going to be okay."

Finally, Charlie managed to open her eyes. Not much, though—just the faintest fluttering of the eyelids. Not enough for them to notice. Just enough to see shadows—three of them. And honestly she couldn't tell Stiles from Allison. Which felt a bit awkward.

"Of course she going to freaking be okay," she heard Stiles growl. "It's Charlie. All the crap we've gone through? All the crap she's been through? She's always okay. She always has to be okay."

"And she will be," Allison whispered in an urgent voice, though that voice may not have been altogether convincing. "She'll be fine."

"That's what I just said!" Stiles snapped. "Isn't that what I just said?! Because I'm pretty sure that's what I just said!"

"Stiles," Scott said in a placating tone. "It's okay. You need to calm down."

"I swear to God, if anybody else tells me to calm down—"

"You know what," Charlie forced out, her words coming out slow and slurred. Her mouth felt sticky and dry, like the aftermath of a bad hangover. "It's rude to talk about someone like they're not there."

Next she heard the sound of three voices, all at once.

"Charlie!"

Those three shadowed figures above her suddenly became larger as they all leaned in. Blinking a few more times, the dim light of the mood finally managed to reach her eyes. The images slowly crystallized, the individual features becoming sharper and more distinct until she could distinguish between them. Three sets of eyes stared down at her—the doe-eyed but deadly princess, the concerned puppy, and that last pair, those light brown, panicked ones that kept scanning her face. All of them were fine, but all of them were worried. She felt a pressure on her left hand and glanced down to see that Stiles was gripping it tightly. She wanted to take his hand, to squeeze to back, but she couldn't. Her eyes roved around, looking for any change in her surroundings. She was back in the clearing near where the cars were parked. They must have hauled her out there while she was unconscious.

"How long have I been out," Charlie muttered.

"You left to go get the fries like ten...fifteen minutes ago, maybe?" Stiles replied. The words came out rushed and panicked, like he was out of breath. His response made her frown to herself. Ten minutes? She felt like she had been under at least an hour. Maybe even two.

"Can somebody sit me up please," she said, her eyes darting between the three disembodied heads hovering above her. "I'm sorta paralyzed here and I really don't like the world from this angle."

Stiles swallowed heavily and nodded in a way that was almost frantic. "Y—yeah," he stammered out. "Yeah, of course."

Stiles scrambled out of her plane of vision for a moment, and then she felt herself being hauled upwards. Stiles pulled her towards him, her back pressed against his chest, and wrapped an arm around her middle to keep her steady. She could feel his heart beating in his chest and he rested his chin on her shoulder. Which would have been sweet—and it was—except that he somehow managed to get some of her hair in his mouth and ended having to spit it out awkwardly. "Are you okay?" he whispered quietly.

"I'm fine," Charlie murmured back. "Or at least I will be. You know, when I can actually move again."

Stiles tightened his hold around her like he was afraid she would disappear. She got the feeling that, when she told him she was okay, he didn't really believe it. And honestly she wasn't sure if she believed it either.

"Charlie," Allison murmured urgently, forcing Charlie to redirect her attention. "What happened to you? I—I thought that the kanima venom paralyzed people." Then, suddenly, something in her face changed. Those doe eyes of hers went wide with something between fear and abject horror and she clapped her hands over her mouth. "O—oh my God! Your nose."

Charlie's brow furrowed in confusion, but then she felt it. That small trickle of liquid sliding down her upper lip. She didn't need a mirror to know that it was pitch black. "Oh my God, you've got to be kidding me," she drawled out. "Again with this shit?"

"What do you mean, again?!" Allison exclaimed.

Charlie let out a frustrated sigh and rolled her eyes. "It's because of the Peter thing."

Allison's forehead creased into a frown and she looked between the rest of the group, searching for some sort of explanation. "What's she talking about?"

"I've answered this question too many times today," Charlie muttered. "Can someone else take this one?"

"Alpha werewolves can do this sort of memory transfer thing," Stiles answered for her. "Peter did it to her before he died and now his ghost living in her subconscious. She hallucinates a bit, has bad reactions to supernatural stuff. It's a whole big thing."

Allison's jaw dropped open and she looked at Charlie with a mixture of concern, sympathy, and a smidgen of accusation. "How could you not tell me about this?!"

"She didn't tell anybody till last week," Stiles replied, sounding vaguely pissed off

"Last week! Charlie, everything with Peter went down like two months ago!"

"Oh my God!" Charlie groaned. "Can we just wait till later to scold me? In case you guys forgot, Jackson is now on the loose and that means that people are about to start dying. We have bigger problems right now. Like how epically screwed we all are."

Allison stared at her with a serious look, but after a few moments it faltered. Because Charlie was right. And as much as Allison didn't want to admit it, she knew that Charlie was right. The story was the same now as it was at the beginning of this whole fiasco. They just had bigger priorities to deal with. She could accept that. Why the hell couldn't they?

Her face falling, Allison ran her hands through her hair with an almost anguished frustration before clambering to her feet. She began pacing frantically, gnawing on her fingernails, her eyes darting back and forth like she was reading the page of a book. Like maybe that book had some sort of plan or course of action they could take, it would solve all their problems. Unfortunately for all of them, it looked like that book was about as blank as Charlie's mind.

Allison pulled at her hair and slowly came to a stop. Her newfound stillness didn't make Charlie feel any more comfortable than her manic pacing. Somehow the sudden lack of movement felt like she was somehow giving up, like her actions had suddenly become useless. Or maybe Charlie was being overly dramatic. That wasn't exactly unheard of.

Scott moved to stand next to Allison, the two of them staring blankly at the prison van. The doors to the back had been thrown wide open to reveal the empty interior. Almost like it was taunting them. And then Charlie heard those words, barely above a whisper but with the force of a gong.

"We have to tell my father."

Charlie felt her breathing hitch in her chest. Telling Mr. Argent about everything was the nuclear option. The option of last resort. Telling Mr. Argent about Jackson meant telling him about everything else, including but not limited to the fact that Scott and Allison were secret lovers in the nighttime. And when the Argents found themselves a target, they shot to kill. As much as she wanted to punch him in the face the majority of the time, she didn't wish death on the guy. He was just a lost kid. They all were.

But regardless of the threat of Allison's dad knowing everything hanging over her head, that's not the part that scared her the most—not by a long shot. You could say a lot of things about Chris Argent—many of them unflattering—but when it came down to it, the man had a code. He did what he thought was right, even if his opinions were, quite frankly, wrong. What really and truly scared her was that telling Allison's dad meant telling Allison's grandfather. She didn't know a lot about that man, but she did know one thing. He and Kate had the same smile, a smile belonging more to a predator than a hunter.

"Allison," Charlie murmured, her voice slow and halting. "Are we sure that this is the move that we want to make?"

Allison glanced over her shoulder at Charlie, her eyes filled with regret. "There are no other moves here, Charlie. All that we've got here is bad and worse. This isn't one of those times where everything ends up okay."

Charlie let out a bitter snort. "You'll have to remind me when that has ever happened for us."

She took a small step towards her boyfriend. "Scott," she said, the edge in her tone making him twitch. "He's going to kill someone!"

Charlie felt Stiles's arms tighten around her even more, as much for his comfort as for her own. She tried to will her arms to move, to take his hand—to do something—but they lay limp and useless at her side. From the heavy, intermittent breaths in her ear and the irregular rising and falling of his chest, she could feel his panic just as palpably as she felt her own. The both of them studied the back of Scott's head, waiting for some sort of response. He had the most to lose. It was his call.

It took a few moments for Scott to reply. He had wandered away from the rest of them—from the empty van—towards the cliff face. "O—okay," he whispered through heavy, anxious pants. "Tell him. Tell him everything."

"Scott," Stiles, who had been unnervingly quiet throughout the whole discussion, muttered from his place behind her. "Scott, I gotta tell my dad too."

Scott exhaled sharply and gave a jerky nod of agreement before letting his head sag on his shoulders. His back was turned to them, looking over the cliff face at the blinking lights of the city below, but she was pretty sure she knew which expression he was wearing on his face. It was his 'the weight of the world is on my shoulders' face. His 'everything is my fault' face. Which was why the next words out of his mouth didn't surprise her one bit. Though she really wished they did.

"This is all my fault."

"Shut up, Scott," Charlie grumbled. "Of course it's not your fault. It's Derek's fault. And if you go back a little further, it's Peter's fault. But it sure as hell isn't yours."

"She's right, Scott," Allison said urgently. "It's not your fault, really it's not. But we have to tell them. We're just a bunch of teenagers. We can't handle this."

"You're right," Scott murmured in quiet agreement.

Allison let out a heavy sigh and shook her head. She shifted on her feet, turning around and looking down at Charlie and Stiles where they sat. "How are you going to convince your dad?" she asked quietly.

She felt Stiles shrug his shoulders. "I don't know."

Slowly, Scott turned to face the rest of them, his eyes glowing a vibrant yellow. "He'll believe me."

A knot formed in the pit of her stomach at the prospect. Telling the Argents was one thing—they already knew about the carnival of crazy going on in this town. For them werewolves and a giant lizard monster wreaking havoc was just another day at the office. Literally. And she had been introduced to the idea gradually, putting the clues together herself. Scott waltzing in and transforming in front of the sheriff would be like dropping him in the middle of the ocean without so much as some kid floaties to keep him from drowning.

Then there was the other reason for her not liking this plan. The selfish reason. Charlie was no good at being vulnerable. It probably had something to do with her massive control issues. Vulnerability meant putting control in the hands of someone who wasn't her, and she took issue with that. And their big plan? It meant walking up to Allison's dad and the sheriff and handing them the control of her situation. She was not comfortable with that. But then again, they didn't have a lot of options.

"So this is what we're going to do," she announced, looking around for confirmation. "Allison tells her dad and you guys tell Stiles's." It was more of a question than a statement, and she was really hoping someone would contradict her. They didn't. All she got in response was a bunch of small, hesitant nods. Sucking in a deep breath, Charlie gave a nod of her own. "Great," she said dully. "So let's do it."

"I'll take Charlie home," Allison said, taking a few steps towards her.

"No," Charlie said, her tone adamant. "No, I can't go home like this. There's no way Mel can find me like this. And there's no way you're going to be able to get me through the front door now that I've gone all boneless on you guys."

Allison bit her lip nervously and stared down at her. "Charlie, we can't just leave you here."

Charlie scrunched her face up into a quizzical expression and narrowed her eyes at the girl. "Um, not what I was suggesting, Allison."

"You know what I meant," the other girl said, gesturing up and down Charlie's form. "You're in no condition to—"

"Look, you need to get to your dad as soon as possible, and that can't happen if you're babysitting me," Charlie replied frankly. She squeezed her eyes shut and screamed internally. Great. Fan-freaking-tastic. She was the baggage—the dead weight. Useless. And when you were useless the best you could do was make yourself as minimally inconvenient as possible. "Stiles and Scott can leave me in the Jeep," she sighed out. "I can sober up or whatever the hell you want to call it in the Jeep while they talk to the sheriff."

A hesitant wince appeared on Allison's face. "Charlie—"

"Look, we have jobs to do," Charlie shot back. Then she looked down her pointless legs and frowned. "Or at least most of us have jobs to do. Let's just get through the night. Somebody put me in the Jeep."

"Wha—are you sure?" Stiles murmured.

"Yes, Stiles," Charlie muttered. "I'm sure. I am completely dedicated to doing nothing and sitting in a corner."

"That feels like sarcasm."

"It is," she replied. "And yet it is also simultaneously a serious gesture. I'm complicated like that."

Stiles let out a heavy, regretful sigh, before shifting behind her. Slowly, she felt herself being lowered to the ground. Stiles scrambled to her side, crouching over her with a stony expression on his face. He looked up and down her form, his jaw twitching violently. "Okay," he said, talking more to himself than to her. "Okay. Let's get you to the Jeep."

He reached forwards, adjusting her legs so he could loop an arm under her knees while dragging one of her arms over his shoulder. Bracing a knee against the ground, he tried to lift her, but stumbled under her weight. It wasn't surprising. She was basically a 125 pound sack of flour. A few moments later, Scott appeared at Stiles's shoulder. "Hey, man," he said in a low tone. "I can get her to the car."

"I got it," Stiles muttered back.

"Stiles—"

"I said I got it!" Stiles growled.

Scott froze, blinking in surprise at the ferocity of the response, but then nodded in quiet understanding. "Yeah," he murmured quietly, clapping a hand on his best friend's shoulder. "You got it."

It took a few more moments, but soon Stiles had managed to scoop her up and staggered towards the car. Allison darted in front of him, yanking the door open and allowing him to place Charlie inside. "You know one of these days," he whispered as he buckled her in, "you're going to have to learn to stop doing stupid crap."

"You talk like I was the only one who got kanima-ed," she quipped back, a sarcastic smile pulling at the corners of her lips. "At least it happened to me when there was some risk involved. You got taken down by a door handle."

Usually when she threw those little barbs at Stiles, he would have one of two reactions. Response number one involved him laughing with that weird, slightly manic laugh he sometimes had which pretty much said, 'I'm laughing, but I'm thinking about boiling you in a vat of acid'. Response number two was basically just him glowering at her. But this time he didn't do either of those things. He just stared at her for a moment, almost blankly, before giving her a simple nod and making his way to the driver's side while Scott lingered with Allison for a moment, whispering sweet nothings or whatever the hell it was that they did.

Charlie shifted her head as much as she could and studied Stiles's profile. He was just sitting there, staring out the windshield with a deadened look on his face. The dim light of the moon cast shadows across his face, and for the first time she could remember the angles of it appeared harsh. Internal conflict was brewing behind those shadowed eyes. A hollow pit formed in her chest at the sight of him like that. "Stiles," she whispered, trying to get him to look at her, but the only response she received was a tightening of his hold on the steering wheel, squeezing it until his knuckles went white. Charlie bit her lip, that sensation of hollowness growing. "Stiles—"

Before she could get another word out, the passenger door swung wide open to reveal Scott. He carefully climbed over her, seating himself between Charlie and the freaking stone statue sitting in the driver's seat. Without another word, Stiles shoved the keys in the ignition and twisted, causing the engine to roar to life.

(*)*(*)*(*)*(*)*(*)*(*)*(*)*(*)*(*)*(*)*(*)*(*)

The car ride to the police station was completely silent. Maybe it was because none of them had anything to say. She sure as hell wanted to say something, but every time she opened her mouth it felt like her vocal chords seized up. Actually, she was pretty sure none of them were talking because they were all too busy thinking. Thinking about the fact that they were about change absolutely everything. Taking a deep breath, Charlie glanced past Scott, looking at Stiles. His dad. It was his dad they were going to tell. It was his relationship they were about to test with this. And the moment when she was supposed to hold his hand, she couldn't. She could kind of wiggle her pinky. That's it. And frankly the act of wiggling one's pinky didn't really offer that much emotional support.

By the time they reached the police station, Charlie felt like she was about to jump out of her skin. It actually, physically itched, like someone had forced her into some horrible wool sweater that she just couldn't take off. Or like she was covered in ants. The nervous energy was building up in her to a degree that, when she finally did regain some degree of motor function, she couldn't guarantee that she wouldn't rip off all her clothes and start sprinting down the street naked.

Finally, the car came to a stop, pulling into an empty parking spot. When Stiles finally shut off the engine, the silence surrounding them became even more perfect, save for their breathing, labored as it was. "Okay," Stiles said, speaking for the first time in like twenty minutes. Which was the longest she's ever heard him go without talking. "Okay, so we're going to do this. We're just going to walk in there and say, 'Dad, werewolves are real,' you do the whole—" he waved his hand in Scott's face "—the whole thing and that's that. Job done. Right?"

He looked between the two of them, seeking some sort of reassurance, but Charlie still couldn't think of a damn thing to say. All she could do was smile weakly. She just...didn't know how to make it better. But Scott did. He clapped a hand on Stiles's shoulder and gave it a squeeze. "It's gonna be okay, dude."

Stiles exhaled sharply and nodded. "Yeah. Yeah, of course it is."

Letting out a grunt, Stiles reached for the door handle and opened the door, piling out of the car with Scott following soon after and leaving Charlie kicking herself for being such a freaking emotionally constipated idiot. She squeezed her eyes shut and let her head fall back against the headrest. 'It's going to be okay.' That's all she had to say, and she didn't. Jesus, she was broken, wasn't she?

"You moron," she muttered to herself. "You complete moron."

Her mental diatribe came to a halt, though, at the squeaking sound of slightly rusty hinges. Her eyes snapped back open to find the car door on her side wide open and Stiles standing there, looking at her with that same slightly hollow expression. "It, uh, it shouldn't take too long I guess," he said, glancing over his shoulder. "I mean how long can it take, right?"

"Right," she replied, her voice slightly higher pitched than usual. "Well I'm all good here." She let out an uncomfortable laugh and made a face at him. "It's not like I can go anywhere. But I'll show you something I've been working on." She glanced down at her right hand, indicating for him to follow her line of vision. Her hand was lying on the seat next to her, flat against the pleather seat material. Concentrating on those few fingers, she managed to curl her fingers inwards so that only the middle finger was left straight. "Boom. How's that for progress?"

Stiles glanced between her and her hand a few times, a pinched look appearing on his face, his mouth screwing up in that weird way it did when he was actively trying not to smile. "You're flipping me off?" he demanded. "Really? Now?"

"Well a thumbs-up seemed kind of flippant, so..."

An almost involuntary chuckle forced its way out of Stiles's mouth and he leaned forwards, resting his forehead against frame of the car. "You are such an idiot."

"That's rich coming from you."

This was usually the part where Stiles rolled his eyes at her and threw out one of his 'oh my God, I hate you so much's, but today all of the usual behavioral markers seemed to go out the window today. Instead he fixed with this—this hard, piercing look. He reached forwards, tucking a stray strand of hair behind her ear. "I'm gonna be back soon, okay?" he murmured.

"Yeah," she replied quietly. "Soon."

And then he actually did roll his eyes, leaning towards her as he did so. He hesitated for a moment, but then pressed his lips against hers. Gentle, firm, and deliberate. Charlie sighed into the kiss, feeling a strange sense of relief. But then she heard it. That stupid little squeaking noise, like somebody has stepped on a dog's chew toy. Which meant that Scott was watching them. Stiles let out a groan and pulled back a bit, resting his forehead against hers. "Every freaking time with this guy."

"You should go," Charlie murmured. "Just—just get it over with."

Stiles's face scrunched up into a wince, but nodded in agreement. "Rip the stitches, right?"

"High five for good luck?" she said, smiling a bit.

Stiles's eyebrows shot up, practically disappearing into his hairline. His eyes darted back and forth between her eyes and her hand. "You serious?"

"Deadly."

He looked at her like she was crazy for a few seconds, but after a dramatic sigh he still reached down, lifting her barely functional hand so he could slap their palms together. "There you go," he said, gently placing her hand back in her lap. "You happy now?"

"I am," she replied easily. "Now get the hell out of here."

A silly smile covered his face and he bobbed his head in agreement. "I'll crack a window for you."

"My hero."

Stiles withdrew and closed the door behind him, rapping his knuckles against the surface. Charlie bit her lip nervously and watched the two of them as they retreated towards main door to the station. Stiles shot one more glance at her over his shoulder and she responded with an encouraging smile, but as soon as he turned back around the smile dropped from her face. That feeling she had sometimes—the one where she felt something was about to go horribly and irrevocably wrong? It was back. And more often than not it ended up being right. She was like those animals that could sense drastic changes in the weather or that random old person whose sciatica acted up when it was about to rain. She was a freaking oracle for shit hitting the fan.

Fifteen minutes. Maybe twenty. That's how much time this should have taken. Charlie stared at that stupid clock on the dashboard, watching the minutes tick by. One minute turned into five, turned into twenty, turned into forty five. With each change in that infuriating configuration of numbers, she felt her anxiety grow. That gnawing sensation in the pit of her stomach had been right.

Gradually, Charlie felt her body come back to her. It started with the extremities—the fingers and toes—and then slowly moved up her limbs. The entire process was excruciating, not because of any pain, but because of the sensation of helplessness. Complete and total loss of control, at the most basic level. Hell, Allison called her twice, and she couldn't even make herself answer the damn phone. The idea that someone or something could take that from her? It wasn't an idea that she wanted to accept. Something was going on inside that police station, and there wasn't a damn thing she could do about it. Not yet at least.

At the hour mark, Charlie had enough of her faculties back under her control to walk. Was it coordinated? No. But it was enough. Wrenching the car door open, she stumbled onto the asphalt, clutching the car door for support. She staggered towards the station, holding onto the railing as she ascended the stairs.

In the front of the office, everything seemed business as usual for the night shift. One woman at the main entryway, a few bored, khaki-clad officers sitting at their desks—judging by the way one hand was on the space bar and the other hand was on the arrow keys at least three of them were playing video games—and the entire place smelled of crappy coffee, mildew, and industrial strength cleaners. Charlie hobbled over towards the main desk, leaning against it and waiting for the woman to notice her. "Is there anything I can do for you?" the woman drawled out, not bothering to look up from the paperwork she was scribbling in.

"Um, yeah," she said, leaning further across the desk in a vain attempt to attract the woman's attention. Maybe she could have tried flirting with her, but she didn't have Derek's jaw line. Or his stubble. She cleared her throat awkwardly. "I was hoping speak with the sheriff."

"He's busy," was the only response she received.

"I—I know that," Charlie replied. "He's in there with some of my friends and I was just wondering if—"

"The sheriff's official business is confidential," the woman deadpanned. "If you want to speak with him, you'll have to wait. You can sit over there."

Still not looking up from her work, the woman pointed off to the left, towards a couple of wooden benches that probably originated from the dumpster behind Ikea. Grumbling to herself, Charlie dragged her feet towards them and collapsed into the seat, the rickety benches squeaking and shaking as she sat down. That pit of anxiety? It kept getting bigger. 'Official' business. The woman had said 'official' business. Meeting your son and his friend for a little light conversation did not qualify as official. Something _was_ wrong. And it didn't take very long for her to figure out what.

"Is there any half-way decent coffee in this dump," an all too familiar voice announced to the whole room. "This crap tastes like battery acid."

Charlie's jaw twitch violently and her hands clench into fists so tight her nails dug into the flesh of her palm, cutting deep semicircles into her skin. Her entire body began to shake, and she couldn't quite tell if it was anger, fear, or withdrawal symptoms. "Are you expecting a freaking cappuccino machine?" she spat bitterly. "This isn't your dad's country club. It's a police station."

At the sound of her voice, Jackson's spine straightened. By the time he turned around, he had that insufferable smirk already plastered over his face. "Oh, hey, Chuck," he said cheerfully. He swaggered over towards her, barefoot and swaddled in one of the khaki jackets the officers wore like some overgrown baby, and took the seat next to her. "It's nice to see that you've decided to join the party."

Charlie glowered back at him, fighting the urge to punch him in that smug face. "Jackson, what the hell did you do?"

His eyes widened innocently. Or at least as close to innocent as he could get. "Oh, this isn't about what I did," he replied. "This is about what your little friends did. You know kidnapping...it's a pretty serious offense. And the son of the local sheriff being a part of it?" He winced theatrically, shaking his head at her. "That does not look good. For anybody. I mean, I think I'm going easy on them just asking for a restraining order. They could be in jail."

"You're getting a restraining order?!" Charlie hissed.

"Yeah, I am," he sneered. "Fifty feet or more. And you should be grateful that you and Allison don't have your names on that piece of paper right next to you boyfriends'!"

Charlie exhaled sharply, looking at him in stunned disbelief. "You have absolutely no idea what you're doing, do you? I can't decide if you're in denial, stupid, or you just don't care." She sank back in her seat and let out a bitter snort. "If we weren't in a police station right now, I would so punch you in the face."

"Aw, Chuck. Your threats are so cute. It's like watching a puppy trying to fight a pit bull."

Unfortunately that threat wasn't exactly one she could follow up on at the moment. She splayed out her fingers, testing out the dexterity, but it that just set off a tremor that caused her entire arm to shake. Swearing under her breath, she clenched the hand back up into a fist and folded her arms across her chest, like she was trying to hide the evidence or something. Letting out a huff, she glanced over at Jackson who was now staring at her with a bizarrely quizzical expression. "What the hell happened to you?" he demanded, his tone that usual level of snide.

"Gee, Jackson, you almost sound concerned."

"There's a difference between caring and curiosity," he spat back. "It's called 'me giving a shit'."

The anger within Charlie began to rise, getting closer and closer to that critical level. If he pushed her much further, she was going to explode with a full-on nuclear core meltdown level of rage. "You happened to me," she drawled out. "You turned into a giant lizard and attacked me. And then you slithered off into the woods."

"Oh, come on," Jackson said, rolling his eyes heavily. "Not you too with this bullshit. How many times do I have to tell you people? Nothing happened to me."

"How did you manage to break out of the truck, hm?" she barreled on. "Chained up, locked inside—how did you manage to break through all that? You are the kanima, Jackson. And the kanima has killed three people."

The gleeful mockery disappeared from Jackson's face and was replaced with a quiet, seething rage. "I didn't kill anybody. Those people dying is not on me."

"You're right." Charlie whispered, making him blink in surprise. He made a face at her and leaned back in his chair, like he was letting her response soak in.

"You know what, Oswin?" he forced out through gritted teeth. "I think that's the first time you've ever not blamed me for something."

"You didn't know what you were doing," she murmured. "So yeah, Jackson, I'm not putting that on you. But let me tell you something, and listen very carefully. It's easy to let moments and events get away from you. You can look back over all the crap that's happened, and wonder how the hell did I get from point A to point B? When did everything change? And you can honestly have no idea when you got on the wrong side of everything."

She leaned in towards him, fixing him with a serious stare. "Well I'm going to make that simple for you Jackson. That moment? It's right now. This is when all of it changes. Because you're right. None of that stuff that happened before was on you. But now you know the truth. You are the kanima. You are killing people. And it's up to you whether or not you're going to do anything about it. This is the moment where everything does start to be your fault."

For a moment, just a moment, she thought she saw something vaguely resembling actual human emotion. But it faded just as soon as it appeared, replaced by the usual mask of apathetic, narcissistic douchiness. Charlie let out a humorless laugh and shook her head. "You should watch your back, Jackson."

"Is that a threat, Oswin?"

"It's a warning," she shot back. "We're not the only ones trying to deal with this problem, and the rest of them aren't as nice as us."

The only response she received was angry glaring, though that was probably to be expected. It was Jackson, after all. He didn't really have access to the full range of emotions. It was just varying levels of rage and insecurity. All of a sudden the phone in her jacket pocket started blasting Allison's ringtone. "You'll have to excuse me," she muttered. "I need to take this call."

Pushing herself up to her feet, she strode away from him as steadily as she could manage, stopping only long enough to deliver one last parting shot. "Oh, and by the way, Jackson?" she said, spinning around to face him, taking small steps backwards. "I saw your penis. Overall not that impressed. I'd say I give it one thumb—" She lifted up her hand like she was giving a thumbs-up, but then she let that thumb slowly droop down. "Oooooh," she drawled out, looking between him and her hand, a wince covering her face. "Would you look at that? It—it just can't seem to stay up."

With one last smirk and ignoring the not-so-quiet muttering of the word 'bitch', Charlie marched back out the front door of the station, away from any prying ears. She pulled her jacket closer in around her and sat down on the steps before hitting the send button and pressing the phone to her ear. "Hey, Allison," she muttered.

A heavy, relieved sigh echoed in the receiver. "_Oh my God, it's good to hear your voice_," Allison sighed out. "_You're okay?"_

Almost as if on cue, her left hand began to shake again. Charlie's solution? She sat on it. Out of sight, out of mind. Object permanence was overrated after all. She cleared her throat awkwardly before answering. "Yeah, Allison," she responded. "I'm okay. I'm just not sure _we_ are." Biting her lip nervously, she glanced over her shoulder at the building behind her. "We seem to have a bit of a problem."

"_Stiles and Scott told you about the kanima, then. It's definitely not good news, but we can deal with it. I think_."

Immediately, Charlie felt all her muscles tense up, her hand gripping the phone so tight she thought it might fracture in her hand. Allison must have sensed something was wrong, because any relief that might have been in her voice faded away instantaneously, replaced by a far more familiar feeling. Panic. "_Lydia translated the bestiary. We found out new information about the kanima. That's the problem you were talking about, right? Please tell me that's what you were talking about._"

Charlie squeezed her eyes shut and pinched the bridge of her nose, biting her lip even harder to hold back the tidal wave of curses that threatened to spill forth from her lips. "I haven't spoken to Stiles or Scott yet," she whispered. "I might not be able to for a while."

"_Why not?_" Allison demanded, her voice jumping up about an octave. "_It's been over an hour. Charlie, why not_?"

Charlie's arm went slack, the phone falling away fro her ear. Her fingers were loose around it, almost allowing it to fall from her hand and clatter to the ground. Allison's voice continued echo out of that tiny speaker, but she found herself ignoring it. Instead she stared out across the parking lot, her eyes fixated on the murky depths of the woods in the distance, almost waiting to see a flash of red eyes. The longer they did this, the more that darkness was creeping into her as well. When it came down to it the lot of them—her, Stiles, Allison, Scott—they were still on their own, confused, lost, and left out in the cold. At least they were on their own together.

Squeezing her eyes shut, she lifted the phone back to her ear. "Allison," she whispered, cutting off the frantic soliloquy on the other side of the phone. "We'll fix it."

**Okay, so that's the next chapter. It's not my favorite ever, but I guess it's a transitional one. I was going to add some Charles fluffy relationship stuff, but it started getting so long that it would be really cumbersome, so that's getting shifted to the next chapter. Sorry! But it's something to look forward to, right? Anyways, I hope you like it. **

**Please vote/comment! Oh, and if you don't know yet, I also have a Liam/OC fic going at them moment! Just in case you're interested.**

**Friendly reminder that I have a Spotify account for my soundtracks! The link is on my profile.**

**Chapter 24 Soundtrack!**

**1) The bowling alley and Peter.**

**-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~My Baby Cried All Night Long - The Ettes**

**2) The silent car ride to the police station. **

**-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~Fade (Original Mix) - Ryan Vail**

**3) Charlie slowly regains her faculties.**

**-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~Not Awake - CALLmeKAT (Kind of obsessed with her at the moment. It's just such a weird, interesting, unique sound.)**

**4) Charlie gets a call from Allison and tries to find out how to face their next challenge.**

**-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~Say Goodbye - Summer Heart**


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